sort-ordering

Are articles in the middle of titles considered when alphabetizing?

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I know that articles (“a”, “an”, “the”) at the beginning of titles are ignored when alphabetizing those titles. What about articles in the middle of a title? For example, what is the proper order of these titles: “Spider-Man and the X-Men” “Spider-Man and X-Factor Shadowgames” Does “the” precede “X-Factor”, or is it ignored so that … Read more

Good words for “before” and “after” that sort the same, both logically and alphabetically?

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TL;DR – Silly OCD question looking for better words. I have a list of event labels in a computer program similar to: renderer_before renderer_after before_notify after_notify This is all well and good…those names convey the context of each event succinctly and accurately. BUT! It bugs me that "before" comes after "after" when sorted alphabetically. Same … Read more

Is ‘sorted ascendingly’ a valid expression?

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Can I use this expression in the sense of ‘sorted in ascending order’? The context is programming: sorting a data-structure or results of a query. Answer It may technically be an acceptable adverb formation, but it is terribly uncomfortable. I would stick with "sorted in ascending order", as it would be readily understood by a … Read more

Does “chronological order” mean the most recent item comes first?

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I want to say that a list is in chronological order. Does this implies that the most recent event comes first? Or do I have to mention that explicitly? This the list of papers in chronological order: 1) … 2019 2) … 2018 Answer In technical and common parlance, the phrase “chronological order” indicates that … Read more

Where does “ö” fall in alphabetical ordering?

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Much to my surprise, I just learned that some English-language documents use the ö character. I need to know, when sorting words in an English-language document, where is ö placed? before A? after Z ? before O ? after O ? Also, I am curious about whether there is a capital ö. If there is, then the justification … Read more

Is there a name for a word where all the letters are in alphabetical order

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After this question, is there a word for a word where all of its letters are in alphabetical order? Examples of such words: AEGILOPS BILLOWY ALMOST (If the word in question is also one of those words, that would be incredible!) Answer You can call them abecedarian words. Abecedarian is an adjective meaning “being arranged … Read more

Word ordering for sequels of works whose titles start with ‘The’

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Hopefully a simple one, but my Google-fu is letting me down. Typically, when alpabetising titles, I would move the ‘The’ to the end of the title but, in the case of a sequel, should that be moved to before or after a sequel numeral? For example: Amazing Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man, The 2 Amazing Spider-Man … Read more

Ordering of question mark, closing quotation mark, and citation

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Let’s say I am quoting the verse “Do you like cheese?” from the Book Of Cheese. Is it: As it is written, “Do you like cheese?” (Book Of Cheese, 43:21) or As it is written, “Do you like cheese” (Book Of Cheese, 43:21)? or As it is written, “Do you like cheese? (Book of Cheese, … Read more