AS3 Sort a Collection of Objects? - actionscript-3

Question

In AS3, how do i sort this list alphabetically? I'm not a programming expert and i've had a hard time just figuring this out.
var searchObject:Object = new Object();
var mapXML:XML;
var xmlLoader:URLLoader = new URLLoader();
xmlLoader.load(new URLRequest("interactive-map.xml"));
xmlLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, parseXML);
function parseXML(event:Event):void {
mapXML = new XML(event.target.data);
for each (var locationElement:XML in mapXML.maplocation) {
searchObject.locationname = locationElement.attribute("locationname");
searchObject.category = locationElement.attribute("category");
trace("Location Name: " + searchObject.locationname);
}
}

Answer 1

first you need to push elements to array/vector.
Then you can sort array with sortOn or sort methods.
Check sortOn/sort methods reference to find sorting options.
var searchObject:Object = new Object();
var searchObjectArray:Array = new Array
var mapXML:XML;
var xmlLoader:URLLoader = new URLLoader();
xmlLoader.load(new URLRequest("interactive-map.xml"));
xmlLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, parseXML);
function parseXML(event:Event):void {
mapXML = new XML(event.target.data);
for each (var locationElement:XML in mapXML.maplocation) {
searchObject = new Object();
searchObject.locationname = locationElement.attribute("locationname");
searchObject.category = locationElement.attribute("category");
searchObjectArray.push(searchObject);//pushing elements to array
}
searchObjectArray.sortOn("locationname")//sorting array
for each ( var searchObjectElement:Object in searchObjectArray)
{
trace("Location name: " + searchObjectElement.locationname);//printing sorted array
}
}

Answer 2

Try something ike this:
var nodes:Array = [];
for each (var locationElement:XML in mapXML.maplocation) {
nodes[nodes.length] = locationElement;
}
nodes.sortOn(locationname);
I'm not sure if this will work with XML array elements. If it doesn't, try using sort() with a compareFunction.

Answer 3

I think you need to somehow wrap this in a collection class or map it over like Amy suggests, here's an example that uses an XMLCollection http://www.webdevotion.be/blog/2008/01/22/how-to-sort-an-xmllist-using-e4x/