Alphabetizing Help

**BenjieLop** · 06-06-2011, 02:02 PM

GIVEN

Smith, John
Smith, Aaron
Smith, Zach
Smith, Betsy

QUESTION -- how can I make the above appear as

Smith, Aaron
Smith, Betsy
Smith, John
Smith, Zach

Thank you in advance and regards.

**Richard Buttrey** · 06-06-2011, 02:05 PM

Hi,

At the risk of stating the obvious: by sorting them. If the names are in two columns use the first column as the primary key and the second as the secondary key.

Regards

**BenjieLop** · 06-06-2011, 02:13 PM

Originally Posted by Richard Buttrey

Hi,

At the risk of stating the obvious: by sorting them. If the names are in two columns use the first column as the primary key and the second as the secondary key.

Regards

I apologize for not being clear ... all the entries are in one cell and the last name is separated from the first name by a comma.

**mahju** · 06-07-2011, 10:32 AM

Hi
Your question is not still clear.

If entries are in the same cells even then you can use sort command to get the required result.

If you want to separate the two names in two different cells use search function and then use sort command on both columns.

If you have an entry in B3 then use

Extract "Smith"

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Extract "john" etc

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If it is not helpful put more data in an excel file and upload

Regards

**Richard Buttrey** · 06-07-2011, 11:10 AM

Hi,

Can you clarify. Do you literally mean that all the text you show is in a single cell. I presume you mean that each of the four lines you showed are in 4 cells, e.g. A1:A4.

What's stopping you clicking anwhere in A1:A4 and then choosing SORT from the menu?

Regards

**BenjieLop** · 06-07-2011, 07:42 PM

1. The four entries that I listed are, for exercise purposes, in Cells A1:A4 (each name is entered in its own single cell)

2. The output (properly alphabetized list) will, say, appear in Cells B1:B4

I hope this makes it clearer. Thanks again.

Originally Posted by Richard Buttrey

Hi,

Can you clarify. Do you literally mean that all the text you show is in a single cell. I presume you mean that each of the four lines you showed are in 4 cells, e.g. A1:A4.

What's stopping you clicking anwhere in A1:A4 and then choosing SORT from the menu?

Regards

**shg** · 06-07-2011, 07:45 PM

Just to repeat, why not sort them? Data > Sort, ...

**requiem** · 06-08-2011, 02:07 PM

Hi - You can put the surname and first name into two separate columns by using the "text to columns" feature in excel 2007 on the data tab. Choose "delimited with a coma", and exel will dump the entire name into two columns. You can then sort by first name. If you want to for whatever reason still show the last and first name together in a third column/cell, you can choose to not overwrite when using the text to columns feature, or you can concatenate after the fact.