How to sort this kind of list easily?

[Anthony Baxter]

On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 17:03:51 +0800, BruceKL WhoH <brucewhohkl at gawab.com> wrote:
> Hi,all
>      I have a list like [(id,string),...],for example:
> 
>      [(1,'xxxxx'),(7,'ppppp'),(4,'gggggg'),...]
> 
>          I want to sort this list according to the id of each element. After sorting,the list will become:
> 
>      [(1,'xxxxx'),(4,'gggggg'),(7,'ppppp')...]


>>> l=[(1,'xxxxx'),(7,'ppppp'),(4,'gggggg'),(2,'ffff'),(12,'hhhhh')]
>>> l.sort()
>>> print l
[(1, 'xxxxx'), (2, 'ffff'), (4, 'gggggg'), (7, 'ppppp'), (12, 'hhhhh')]

list.sort sorts tuples by first argument, then second &c. If you want a
custom sort order, look at the decorate-sort-undecorate pattern.

Anthony