How to sort an associative array by its values in

Question

I have the associative array:

array["sub2"] = 1;
array["sub0"] = -1;
array["sub1"] = 0;
array["sub3"] = 1;
array["sub4"] = 0;

What is the most elegant way to sort (descending) by its values where the result would be an array with the respective indices in this order:

sub2, sub3, sub1, sub4, sub0?

Answer 1

There really isn't any such thing as an "associative array" in JavaScript. What you've got there is just a plain old object. They work kind-of like associative arrays, of course, and the keys are available but there's no semantics around the order of keys.

You could turn your object into an array of objects (key/value pairs) and sort that:

function sortObj(object, sortFunc) {
  var rv = [];
  for (var k in object) {
    if (object.hasOwnProperty(k)) rv.push({key: k, value:  object[k]});
  }
  rv.sort(function(o1, o2) {
    return sortFunc(o1.key, o2.key);
  });
  return rv;
}

Then you'd call that with a comparator function.

Answer 2

Here is a variation of ben blank's answer, if you don't like tuples.

This saves you a few characters.

var keys = [];
for (var key in sortme) {
  keys.push(key);
}

keys.sort(function(k0, k1) {
  var a = sortme[k0];
  var b = sortme[k1];
  return a < b ? -1 : (a > b ? 1 : 0);
});

for (var i = 0; i < keys.length; ++i) {
  var key = keys[i];
  var value = sortme[key];
  // Do something with key and value.
}

Answer 3

The best approach for the specific case here, in my opinion, is the one commonpike suggested. A little improvement I'd suggest that works in modern browsers is:

// aao is the "associative array" you need to "sort"
Object.keys(aao).sort(function(a,b){return aao[b]-aao[a]});

This could apply easily and work great in the specific case here so you can do:

let aoo={};
aao["sub2"]=1;
aao["sub0"]=-1;
aao["sub1"]=0;
aao["sub3"]=1;
aao["sub4"]=0;

let sk=Object.keys(aao).sort(function(a,b){return aao[b]-aao[a]});

// now you can loop using the sorted keys in `sk` to do stuffs
for (let i=sk.length-1;i>=0;--i){
 // do something with sk[i] or aoo[sk[i]]
}

Besides of this, I provide here a more "generic" function you can use to sort even in wider range of situations and that mixes the improvement I just suggested with the approaches of the answers by Ben Blank (sorting also string values) and PopeJohnPaulII (sorting by specific object field/property) and lets you decide if you want an ascendant or descendant order, here it is:

// aao := is the "associative array" you need to "sort"
// comp := is the "field" you want to compare or "" if you have no "fields" and simply need to compare values
// intVal := must be false if you need comparing non-integer values
// desc := set to true will sort keys in descendant order (default sort order is ascendant)
function sortedKeys(aao,comp="",intVal=false,desc=false){
  let keys=Object.keys(aao);
  if (comp!="") {
    if (intVal) {
      if (desc) return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[b][comp]-aao[a][comp]});
      else return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[a][comp]-aao[a][comp]});
    } else {
      if (desc) return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[b][comp]<aao[a][comp]?1:aao[b][comp]>aao[a][comp]?-1:0});
      else return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[a][comp]<aao[b][comp]?1:aao[a][comp]>aao[b][comp]?-1:0});
    }
  } else {
    if (intVal) {
      if (desc) return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[b]-aao[a]});
      else return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[a]-aao[b]});
    } else {
      if (desc) return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[b]<aao[a]?1:aao[b]>aao[a]?-1:0});
      else return keys.sort(function(a,b){return aao[a]<aao[b]?1:aao[a]>aao[b]?-1:0});
    }
  }
}

You can test the functionalities trying something like the following code:

let items={};
items['Edward']=21;
items['Sharpe']=37;
items['And']=45;
items['The']=-12;
items['Magnetic']=13;
items['Zeros']=37;
//equivalent to:
//let items={"Edward": 21, "Sharpe": 37, "And": 45, "The": -12, ...};

console.log("1: "+sortedKeys(items));
console.log("2: "+sortedKeys(items,"",false,true));
console.log("3: "+sortedKeys(items,"",true,false));
console.log("4: "+sortedKeys(items,"",true,true));
/* OUTPUT
1: And,Sharpe,Zeros,Edward,Magnetic,The
2: The,Magnetic,Edward,Sharpe,Zeros,And
3: The,Magnetic,Edward,Sharpe,Zeros,And
4: And,Sharpe,Zeros,Edward,Magnetic,The
*/

items={};
items['k1']={name:'Edward',value:21};
items['k2']={name:'Sharpe',value:37};
items['k3']={name:'And',value:45};
items['k4']={name:'The',value:-12};
items['k5']={name:'Magnetic',value:13};
items['k6']={name:'Zeros',value:37};

console.log("1: "+sortedKeys(items,"name"));
console.log("2: "+sortedKeys(items,"name",false,true));
/* OUTPUT
1: k6,k4,k2,k5,k1,k3
2: k3,k1,k5,k2,k4,k6
*/

As I already said, you can loop over sorted keys if you need doing stuffs

let sk=sortedKeys(aoo);
// now you can loop using the sorted keys in `sk` to do stuffs
for (let i=sk.length-1;i>=0;--i){
 // do something with sk[i] or aoo[sk[i]]
}

Last, but not least, some useful references to Object.keys and Array.sort

Answer 4

i use $.each of jquery but you can make it with a for loop, an improvement is this:

        //.ArraySort(array)
        /* Sort an array
         */
        ArraySort = function(array, sortFunc){
              var tmp = [];
              var aSorted=[];
              var oSorted={};

              for (var k in array) {
                if (array.hasOwnProperty(k)) 
                    tmp.push({key: k, value:  array[k]});
              }

              tmp.sort(function(o1, o2) {
                    return sortFunc(o1.value, o2.value);
              });                     

              if(Object.prototype.toString.call(array) === '[object Array]'){
                  $.each(tmp, function(index, value){
                      aSorted.push(value.value);
                  });
                  return aSorted;                     
              }

              if(Object.prototype.toString.call(array) === '[object Object]'){
                  $.each(tmp, function(index, value){
                      oSorted[value.key]=value.value;
                  });                     
                  return oSorted;
              }               
     };

So now you can do

    console.log("ArraySort");
    var arr1 = [4,3,6,1,2,8,5,9,9];
    var arr2 = {'a':4, 'b':3, 'c':6, 'd':1, 'e':2, 'f':8, 'g':5, 'h':9};
    var arr3 = {a: 'green', b: 'brown', c: 'blue', d: 'red'};
    var result1 = ArraySort(arr1, function(a,b){return a-b});
    var result2 = ArraySort(arr2, function(a,b){return a-b});
    var result3 = ArraySort(arr3, function(a,b){return a>b});
    console.log(result1);
    console.log(result2);       
    console.log(result3);