How to sort date strings in accending order in Google Apps Script Javascript

Question

I have 3 columns of dates I need to sort in a spreadsheet.

First I need to sort Horizontally. The dates are in string format.

e.g. "5/3","5/20", "6/3" or sometimes BLANK.

I need everything moved into the left-most column if some of the cells are blank.

Secondly I need to sort the rows by date. range.sort is fine for that.

Here's What I have so far.

function sortDate() {
 var ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();
 var sheet = ss.getSheetByName("Loads");
 var range = sheet.getRange("C9:BA53"); 


  //Sorts Horizontally

    //getValues gives a 2D array. 
    var data = sheet.getRange('AC9:AE53');



    //This for loop with loop through each row
    for(var i=0; i<data.length; i++) 
    {

    var dateArry = [data[i][0],data[i][1],data[i][2]];
          //This for loop with loop through each column
         //for (var j = 0; j < data[i].length ; j ++){
          //This assumes Column AC has the dates you are comparing aganist

         //dateElem = date.split('/');

         //dateElem[1] = Number(dateElem[1]) + 1;

         //newDate = dateElem.join('/');

         var sortDates = dateArry.sort();

         sheet.getRange("AC"+i+"AE"+i).setValues(sortDates);




         };
    };

UPDATED CODE:

Here are the updates I've made. The hardest part is sorting each row of dates. I've added a second for loop to separate each set of dates.

function sortDate() {
 var ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();
 var sheet = ss.getSheetByName("Loads");
 //var range = sheet.getRange("C9:BA53"); 


  //Sorts Horizontally

    //getValues gives a 2D array. 
    var data = sheet.getRange('AC1:AE53').getValues();



    //This for loop with loop through each row
    for(var i=0; i<data.length; i++) {
      for (var j = 8; j < data[i].length ; j ++){

    var dateArry = [data[i][0],data[i][1],data[i][2]];

????????? How do I sort the 3 dates per row????????????

         var sortDates = dateArry.sort();

         //sheet.getRange("AC"+i+":AE"+i).setValues(sortDates);
         sheet.getRange("AC"+i).setValue(sortDates[0]);
         sheet.getRange("AD"+i).setValue(sortDates[1]);
         sheet.getRange("AE"+i).setValue(sortDates[2]);

         };
    };

    };

UPDATED CODE 2:

Here is my 3rd run of the program. It works great except it puts null/empty cells first when sorting. I need anything null to go at the end while keeping the rest in ascending order. Thanks!!!

Example:

inputArray = ["5/3", " ","6/2"]

correctOutput = ["5/3","6/2"," "]

incorrectOutput = [" ", "5/3","6/2"] This is what it is doing now.

3rd set of code:

 function sortDate2() {
 var ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();
 var sheet = ss.getSheetByName("Loads");
 //var range = sheet.getRange("C9:BA53"); 
 //Trying to fix improper sorting. works great for alphabetic sorting


  //Sorts Horizontally

    //getValues gives a 2D array. 
    var data = sheet.getRange('AC9:AE53').getValues();



    //This for loop with loop through each row
    for(var i=0; i<data.length; i++) {


    for (var j = 0; j < data[i].length ; j ++){ 

    var dateArry = [data[i][0],data[i][1],data[i][2]];





         //var sortDates = dateArry.sort(function(a, b){return a-b});
         var sortedDates = dateArry.sort(function (a, b) {
    // '01/03/2014'.split('/')
    // gives ["01", "03", "2014"]
    a = a.split('/');
    b = b.split('/');
    return a[1] - b[1] || a[0] - b[0] || (a===null)-(b===null) ;
});






         data[i][0] = sortedDates[0];
         data[i][1] = sortedDates[1];
         data[i][2] = sortedDates[2];


        };

         };

         sheet.getRange('AC9:AE53').setValues(data);


  };

Answer 1

You could also use sort(sortSpecObj):

Sorts the cells in the given range. Sorts the cells in a given range, by column and order specified.

Here is a snippet from the document:

 var ss = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();
 var sheet = ss.getSheets()[0];
 var range = sheet.getRange("A1:C7");

 // Sorts by the values in the first column (A)
 range.sort(1);

 // Sorts by the values in the second column (B)
 range.sort(2);

 // Sorts descending by column B
 range.sort({column: 2, ascending: false});

 // Sorts descending by column B, then ascending by column A
 // Note the use of an array
 range.sort([{column: 2, ascending: false}, {column: 1, ascending: true}]);

 // For rows that are sorted in ascending order, the "ascending" parameter is
 // optional, and just an integer with the column can be used instead. Note that
 // in general, keeping the sort specification consistent results in more readable
 // code. We could have expressed the earlier sort as:
 range.sort([{column: 2, ascending: false}, 1]);

 // Alternatively, if we wanted all columns to be in ascending order, we would use
 // the following (this would make column 2 ascending)
 range.sort([2, 1]);
 // ... which is equivalent to
 range.sort([{column: 2, ascending: true}, {column: 1, ascending: true}]);

I also agree with @Dean, using Date.parse() will make it easier to sort.

Hope this helps.