How to sort a structure array based on a specific field

How do we sort a structure array based on a specific field?

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

We have an instruction blog on how to do that in older versions of MATLAB (before R2013b):

https://blogs.mathworks.com/pick/2010/09/17/sorting-structure-arrays-based-on-fields/

If you are using a MATLAB version newer than R2013b, you can take advantage of the "sortrows" function in tables for a simpler workflow:

>>  % suppose 's' is the struct array. 'DOB' is the field that contains date and time.
>>  T = struct2table(s); % convert the struct array to a table
>>  sortedT = sortrows(T, 'DOB'); % sort the table by 'DOB'
>>  sortedS = table2struct(sortedT) % change it back to struct array if necessary

Answer 2

[Norbert Nitzsche]

% suppose 's' is the struct array and you want to sort it by the values in field 'f_sortby'

[x,idx]=sort([s.f_sortby]);

s=s(idx);

[Bruno Luong]

"Using curly braces should work for both numerical and text values"

Not for me

>> s=struct('num', {1 2 3})

s = 

  1×3 struct array with fields:

    num

>> s(1)

ans = 

  struct with fields:

    num: 1

>> s(3)

ans = 

  struct with fields:

    num: 3

>> [x,idx]=sort({s.num})
Error using sort
Input argument must be a cell array of character vectors.