Re: Why didn't this sort?

If you're looking for the array @$outputRef itself to be sorted, you'll have to do something like this:

$outputRef = [ sort @$outputRef ];

When you say sort @$outputRef, you're creating an anonymous array with the sorted values, but not actually assigning the sorted values back into @$outputRef.

-- Mike

--
just,my${.02}

[tadman]

I know this is a minor thing, but it's probably best to make sure that you use the same reference instead of making a new one. If $ouputRef was pulled from a blessed object, for example, then this reassignment creates a new instance that isn't linked in.

Assign back to the same reference just to be safe:

@$outputRef = sort @$outputRef;

These are "equivalent" in terms of functionality, but not in terms of effect. For an example of what I mean:

my $foo = [ [ 4, 1, 6 ], [ 4, 1, 5 ] ];
my $foo_0 = $foo->[0];
my $foo_1 = $foo->[1];

 $foo_0 = [ sort @$foo_0 ];   # $foo_0 is "detached"
@$foo_1 = sort @$foo_1;       # Goes back into $foo->[1]

use Data::Dumper;
print Dumper($foo);