Sort table by date

[uncle]

Word 2013 – Would like to sort a 4 column table by date, ascending order. The 4th column has the dates in format
8/14. 12/18, etc.Table won’t sort. Have put “0” in front of single month entries, that didn’t sort either.

Want to keep the data in the other columns to correspond to the dates. Can this be done in one operation?
Many thanks.

[HansV]

Select the entire table before sorting.
When you click Sort, make sure that you select the 4th column, and select Date as type:

S2813.png

[curious]

yes, Hans. That's what I did and when it didn't sort is when I wrote to the Lounge for help.

Edited: I created a new table and the sort result didn't change for ascending/descending. Sorted by 4th column, date

[HansV]

Could you attach a small sample document in which sorting the table fails for you?

[DaveA]

If you have any spaces within the date, then remove them and try again.

Dates do not have spaces

[uncle]

Thanks, but no spaces. WIll post a sample table that won't sort

[uncle]

Here is a sample table





(sorry for attachment, but using 'table=" didn't align properly, as shown below)
[table=] Genelin, michael Requiem for a gypsy 12/14
Gentry amy Good as gone 7/17
she, Francisco Say Her Name 5/11
[/table]

[HansV]

Thanks. I did the following:

- Change the system date format to m/d/yyyy (I normally use Dutch format dd-mm-yyyy), since your document contains US dates.
- Open the document.
- Click in the table (anywhere).
- On the Layout tab of the Ribbon, under Table Tools, click Sort.
- Select 'Column 4' from the 'Sort by' dropdown.
- This automatically changed the Type to Date.
- Click OK.

This was the result (1 = before clicking OK, 2 = afterwards):

S2815.png

So it works correctly for me. I'm using Word 2019.

[uncle]

Ah, I get it! It's being sorted by month, not year. Is there a way to sort by year(and keeping month)? Am I asking too much for that?

Thank you much

[HansV]

Do you mean that 12/14 means December 2014?

[uncle]

Yes

[HansV]

Ah - that explains your problem. I fear that you'll have to write the dates as 5/2011, 7/2017 etc. to make Word recognize the last number as a year.

[uncle]

My thanks for your time, Hans