↑
Main Page

text values

<tr>

<td>Spring Budget.xls</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>Job Description - Web Designer.doc</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>Saved Web Page.pdf</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>Chapter 1.doc</td>

</tr>

</tbody>

</table>

This HTML code sorts both columns by using strings; therefore, the third argument isn’t necessary when

calling

sortTable()

. Even though the first column contains images, the code uses the value attribute to

sort it in both ascending and descending order.

Summary

This chapter explored using JavaScript to move more server-based functionality onto the client: sorting

HTML tables. You learned about using comparison functions along with the

Array

’s

sort()

method to

define custom sort order. With this knowledge, you went on to sort columns with string values in

ascending order.

Next, you learned how to sort in descending order by using the

reverse()

method of the

Array.

Then,

columns with different values were introduced for sorting as well. After you wrote a small conversion

function, you were able to sort integers, floats, and dates in table columns. Lastly, you learned how to

account for table cells that contained HTML instead of simple text values.

Along the way, you learned about closures in JavaScript, which allow generated functions to contain ref-

erences to variables that are seemingly out of scope. Using closures, you saw how the seemingly limited

definition of comparison functions could be extended to allow the usage of additional data to determine

which of two values should occur first.

385

Sorting Tables

15_579088 ch12.qxd 3/28/05 11:40 AM Page 385