FastSort Manual

Using FastSort Commands

FastSort Manual—429834-003

3-11

DESCENDING Command

Use the DESCENDING command to sort or merge records so that the values of each

key field specified in the command are in largest-to-smallest order. ASCENDING and

DESCENDING commands can apply to the same sort run, which causes the values of

some key fields to be in smallest-to-largest order.

The DESCENDING command provides this information before a sort or merge run:



Location of one or more key fields for ordering records



Length and order of key fields



Type of data in each key field

You must specify at least one DESCENDING or ASCENDING command for each sort

or merge run. The ASCENDING Command on page 3-2 has the same parameters as

the DESCENDING command.

field

designates the location of a key field in the record. You can specify field in either

of two ways:

startcol : endcol

startcol FOR count

startcol

is an integer giving the beginning column number of a key field. The numbering

of record columns, or bytes, begins with 1.

endcol

is an integer giving the last column number of a key field.

count

is an integer giving the length, in bytes, of a key field.

type

describes the type of data in the key field. The default type is STRING. You can

specify type as:

STRING

UPPER

INTEGER

REAL

UNSIGNED

DESC[ENDING] field [ type ] [ , field [ type ] ]...