Menu
Coddy logo textTech

Sort Command

Part of the Fundamentals section of Coddy's Terminal journey — lesson 32 of 82.

The sort command arranges the lines of a file in alphabetical or numerical order.We have fruits.txt:
banana
apple
cherry
mango
Simply type sort followed by the filename:
sort fruits.txt
The output will be:
apple
banana
cherry
mango
Useful flags:-r — sort in reverse (descending) order:
sort -r fruits.txt
-n — sort numerically instead of alphabetically:
sort -n numbers.txt
Without -n, numbers are sorted as text, so 10 would come before 2. With -n, they sort correctly by value.-u — sort and remove duplicate lines at the same time:
sort -u fruits.txt
-k — sort by a specific column (useful for files with multiple columns):
sort -k2 data.txt   # sort by the second column
Nota: sort no modifica el archivo original — solo imprime el resultado ordenado en la pantalla.
challenge icon

Challenge

Beginner

Use the sort command on fruits.txt:

  1. Sort the file in alphabetical order using sort
  2. Sort the file in reverse alphabetical order using sort -r

Hint: Run both commands one after the other. The original file is not changed — sort only prints the result.

Try it yourself

Terminal
quiz iconTest yourself

This lesson includes a short quiz. Start the lesson to answer it and track your progress.

All lessons in Fundamentals