sort

Sorts TSV records by one or more keys.

Behavior:

• By default, comparisons are lexicographic.
• With -n/--numeric, comparisons are numeric (floating point).
• With -r/--reverse, the final ordering is reversed.
• Empty fields compare as empty strings in lexicographic mode and as 0 in numeric mode.

Input:

• Reads from files or standard input.
• Files ending in .gz are transparently decompressed.

Output:

• By default, output is written to standard output.
• Use --outfile to write to a file instead.

Header behavior:

• Supports all four header modes. See tva --help-headers for details.
• When header is enabled, header lines are preserved at the top of the output.

Field syntax:

• Use -k/--key to specify 1-based field indices or ranges (e.g., 2, 4-5).
• Multiple keys are supported and are applied in the order given.
• Run tva --help-fields for a full description shared across tva commands.

Examples:

1. Sort by first column tva sort -k 1 file.tsv

2. Sort numerically by second column tva sort -k 2 -n file.tsv

3. Sort by multiple columns tva sort -k 1,2 file.tsv

4. Sort in reverse order tva sort -k 1 -r file.tsv