>>I don't have VFP at hand to test the following, so you might try it.
>>
>>
>>index on str(val(CatNumber)) + CatNumber tag CatNumber
>>
>>
>>Reasoning:
>>
>>val() should give 0 for codes that start with a letter. In this case, the second part should resolve ties.
>
>Hi Hilmar, and thanks for the reply. I did try that along the way to my messy solution, but this puts all the alphas at the top (the numerics are ordered right, of course).
Ah, I see. If you want numbers first. How about adding an iif(). I don't see any problem with testing the first character with left(). Apply this to the first part of the expression.
str(val(iif(between(upper(left(CatNumber),1), "A", "Z"), 999999);
+ CatNumber
Well, this is getting about as messy as your original proposal, in the message that originated this thread.
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