Help talk:Sortable tables Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help_talk:Sortable_tables

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Sorting the following table with class=sortbottom for the bottom 2 rows removes the blank rows, displaying thusly. Qwerty284651 (talk) 21:13, 1 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The rowspan number was wrong. I temporarily added {{static row numbers}} to see that. Also, I added dashes in the blank spots in the bottom 2 rows. Both changes were needed to fix the problem. See diff.

An easier solution is to eliminate the blank columns. And list those years above the table. It would also make the table narrower. --Timeshifter (talk) 06:53, 2 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, that's the alternative I had with removing the years and adding a note above the table about the skipped years. Btw, why does static row display blank without bgcolor? Qwerty284651 (talk) 12:56, 2 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I just created Template:Year in date-sorted table as the inverse of Template:Date table sorting. I welcome input if there are better solutions to achieve the same goal, additional features that would be useful, and or suggestions for a more descriptive template name. Daask (talk) 20:24, 16 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You might get more discussion at Help talk:Table or WP:VPT. I am not really into this now. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:27, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at List of National Women's Soccer League seasons, the table uses "sortbottom" such that if you sort on any column other than "season", the season which was wiped out by COVID goes to the bottom. But this means it's then impossible to re-sort the "season" column into the correct order, so I was wondering if the "sortbottom" could be dispensed with and instead a sortkey put on the block of text which spans all bar the first column in the 2020 row. If "ZZZZ" is used, it sorts at the bottom for the alphabetical columns but at the top for the numerical columns. If "999999" is used, it sorts at the bottom in the numerical columns but top in the alphabetical ones. Is there any value that would sort at the bottom in both types of column.......? ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:47, 10 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I did some edits. I removed class=sortbottom. It causes more problems that it solves.

Here is the sticky table version before I removed class=sortbottom:

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_National_Women%27s_Soccer_League_seasons&oldid=1268590131

In case others want to do further experimentation.

--Timeshifter (talk) 14:52, 10 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@ChrisTheDude: See if you can find anything here:

Help:Sortable tables#Alphabetic sorting order

Help:Sortable tables#Numerical sorting order examples

By the way, why did you remove the sticky table formatting? It is greatly needed on a wide table like that since I made the left column sticky too. Very useful for cell phones. You could have just returned the class=sortbottom without removing the sticky table formatting. That way you can still run tests with class=sortbottom. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:44, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

how to make CDE and test2 not jump in order (wikitable sortable)

— RAFAEL RONEN 13:42, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Rafael Ronen: I am not sure that is possible for the CDE row by itself. Unless you start it off at the top or bottom, and then use class=sorttop or class=sortbottom.

You can make both CDE and test2 rows use class=sortbottom since they start off as consecutive rows on the bottom.

By the way, your signature color and text size is not very accessible. It is very hard to read for me.

{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
!A
!B
|-
|test
|test
|-
|test1
|test1
|- class=sortbottom
!colspan=2|CDE
|- class=sortbottom
|test2
|test2
|}

--Timeshifter (talk) 18:37, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Timeshifter if we use mw- mw-sortable mw-collapsed, press "show" then press order 🔼🔽 then press "hide", so sortbottom is shown

Rafael Ronen 01:31, 18 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

class=mw-sortable is not needed since class=sortable is there.

Looking at the wikitext:

{| class="wikitable sortable mw- mw-collapsed"
|-
!A
!B
|-
|test
|test
|-
|test1
|test1
|- class=sortbottom
!colspan=2|CDE
|- class=sortbottom
|test2
|test2
|}

What do you want to use this for? Totally collapsed tables aren't allowed in articles except in the collapsed tables at the bottom of articles. --Timeshifter (talk) 04:38, 18 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Let's say I have a table with 5 columns. I want only one column to be sortable (others are unnecessary). To do that it seems the only way is to make table class sortable and then add class=unsortable to other 4 columns. I think it would be good to make it possible to make a column sortable with class=sortable independent of table class. It doesn't have to be 1 column, it could be 2 columns in 5 column table. Setenzatsu.2 (talk) 14:46, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Setenzatsu.2: Jroberson108 may have some ideas on whether this is feasible. I think it would be confusing if people start seeing class=sortable in different places in tables. --Timeshifter (talk) 11:36, 5 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Setenzatsu.2 and Timeshifter: Highly unfeasible. Sorting is not implemented through a template that might be easy to manage, but instead through the backend with highly vetted changes geared towards optimal performace. A class has to be added to the table regardless. Changing the default behavior of the table's "sortable" class from sortable to unsortable would not only be less implicit, but is not optimal since most if not all columns in the majority of the uses are sortable. In addition, the change is not backwards compatible and all the current uses would have to be modified by adding sortable classes to columns and removing the now obsolete unsortable classes. Jroberson108 (talk) 16:44, 5 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think Setenzatsu.2 asked for it to replace the current usage, but to supplement it. Gonnym (talk) 09:33, 6 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The table class makes all columns sortable with an optional column class to make specific columns unsortable. Wanting it so the table class does not make all columns sortable with an optional column class to make them sortable changes the current usage to something opposite. Jroberson108 (talk) 04:07, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

When a non-technical person asks a code-related request you shouldn't get too hang on the specific code name they used. Using a new and different class name makes it so there isn't a conflict. Gonnym (talk) 08:11, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't mention anything about code name or conflicting class names. Jroberson108 (talk) 09:58, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Setenzatsu.2, Gonnym, and Jroberson108:. I guess something like class=sort could be used for single-column use. But for it to be used without a template would require modifying the backend code. That would require a feature request at Phabricator. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:01, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that the table class is what is used to add the ability to sort columns by moving rows, applying styling, add sorting to column headers, collapsing rowspans after sorting, etc. Regardless of the new column's class name, it is already sortable because of the table class, therefore redundant unless you change it so the columns are not sortable from the table class, which creates issues with the current usage. The second issue is that they optimize the code due to its sitewide usage and are highly unlikely to add extra or change it to reproduce something that is already possible with the current classes. But you are welcome to ask. Jroberson108 (talk) 14:57, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like it would be a nightmare to code. Especially when the wikitext for a table has both class=sortable and class=sort. And that would happen often as different editors work on a table. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:47, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki syntax is not optimized. That should be a priority as is the code optimization. One shouldn't be more important than the other. If I have a table with 9 columns, and only 1 (or 2 or 3) makes sense to be sortable and I have to put 8 class=unsortable attributes - that's not optimized. I haven't expressed myself clearly in my proposition. As Gonnym said I didn't mean to replace usage, but to supplement it - that doesn't mean the change how class works is neccesary. Now we have table of sortable class and that is fine as it is. Another (sub)class could be implemented let's say "wikitable sortable-specific". It could be done that in the backend there is a translation layer to turn it into "wikitable sortable". "sortable-specific" would allow to point out specific columns to be sortable and other columns would be unsortable by default. It would be used when 50+% of columns is unsortable. Translation layer would just turn "sortable-specific" into "sortable" by adding attribute unsortable to non-specified columns and applying sortable to other columns, in the backend (and that's important). That should be less than 30 lines of code. Just a pseudoclass and translation layer. But it would optimize wiki syntax (from editors' perpective) and save some KBs.Setenzatsu.2 (talk) 21:27, 25 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

In the table to the right if you put very small fractional number in first 5 rows and add asterisk somewhere, it breaks sorting.

Examples:

• Table of specific heat capacities: the article's table values under Isobaric volumetric heat capacity get sorted improperly

AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 09:47, 1 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Alexander Davronov:

data-sort-type=number is a quick fix:

! data-sort-type=number | Fract 
! data-sort-type=number | Bazzz 

Fract	Bazzz
0.001297	1.5
0.00121	0.0
4.422	0.35
3.263	8.0
3.7*	8.4*

The very small numbers don't seem to be a problem if I remove the asterisks, or remove the asterisks from the first 5 cells in a column. I added a row, so there are 6 data rows in this table. And I moved the asterisks to the 6th row:

Fract	Bazzz
0.001297	1.5
0.00121	0.0
4.422	0.35
3.263	8.0
3.7	8.4
3.8*	8.5*

--Timeshifter (talk) 11:15, 1 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, that's what I did. Somehow that bug puzzled folks for 3 years in the article I've linked above. I suggest we put the case into Numerical sorting problems subsection. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:44, 1 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I added: "Asterisks (*) in the first 5 cells break numerical sorting."

Feel free to add more info to the help page. --Timeshifter (talk) 21:15, 1 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 21:29, 1 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]