Sorting Lines: sort

The sort command rearranges lines of text into order. By default it sorts alphabetically (A before B, lowercase after uppercase).

sort crew.txt

Chen
Okafor
Tanaka
Voss

The original file is unchanged: sort prints the sorted result to stdout. You can save it with > sorted.txt if needed.

Reverse order with -r

sort -r crew.txt

Voss
Tanaka
Okafor
Chen

Sorting is case-sensitive by default

Uppercase letters sort before lowercase. If you want true alphabetical order regardless of case, add -f (fold case):

sort -f mixed.txt

Sort in a pipeline

sort is a perfect pipeline citizen: it reads stdin if no file is given:

grep "error" log.txt | sort

This filters errors first, then sorts them alphabetically.

Mission: Cargo Priority List

A supply shuttle just docked and the cargo bay manifest (supplies.txt) is a mess. The quartermaster wants a clean unloading order for the crew.

1. Sort supplies.txt in reverse alphabetical order and display the result on screen.
2. Save that reverse-sorted list into a new file called unload-order.txt.
3. Create a folder called cargo-bay and move unload-order.txt into it.
4. Show just the first item on the list. That is what the crew unloads first.

Expected result

cargo-bay/unload-order.txt holds the six items from water filters down to ammo crates.