Array.sort() method support

[itssubhodiproy]

Feature Spec

let arr: MutArray<num>=[2, 1, 3, 9, 6, 4];
arr.sort();
log("${arr}");  // it should print sorted array in ascending order, eg: [1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 9]

Component

Wing SDK

Community Notes

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[revitalbarletz]

Issue taken by Lauty Suarez!

[Chriscbr]

Sorting is certainly missing! thanks for opening this issue @subh-cs. I noticed a small bug in the issue -- the array you gave was immutable, so it shouldn't be sortable. But of course, sort() makes sense as a capability for MutArrays. I fixed it for your convenience :-)

For implementing this issue I think it would be forward thinking to define a semantics for the sorting. Even if we're using JavaScript's default sort implementation under the hood, we should note the essential edge cases in the docs to ensure the method works as people expect when they're coming from non-JS languages.

For example, if an array contains a collection of structs or class objects, how are the values sorted (supposing no comparison function is provided by the user)? We should include a note in the docstring how this edge case is handled.

I think it would also be handy to document whether or not the sort implementation is stable or unstable since it's a detail relevant for implementing many algorithms.

[ekeren]

@Chriscbr, there are two options of sort that I can think of:

// Option 1: Mutating  - relevant only for MutableArray
arr.sort();
// arr is not sorted 

// Option 2: Non-Mutating - relevant for Array and MutArray
let sorted = arr.sort();
// arr state remains the same 

Did we consider option 2?

[garysassano]

What about reverse()? Should that be a separate method or part of sort() with an optional parameter?

[Chriscbr]

@ekeren I'd name the non-mutating version sorted() and the mutating version sort() - I think we can support both.

@garysassano reverse() as a convenience method sounds like a good idea to me.

[revitalbarletz]

@subh-cs Are you looking into this one?

[Warkanlock]

I'm working on this one

[staycoolcall911]

Sounds good, then I'll assign you

[Warkanlock]

I have a few comments regarding this change:

1. Lack of a comparator function (which might be ideal, and we can iterate on top of that)
2. A comparator function would imply the creation of dynamic typing, and, therefore, we would run into the same problems I encountered when I tried to implement map.entries() #5005.

I'd love to discuss this with a more experienced dev of winglang since this will require more changes than the ones involved in the SDK

[staycoolcall911]

Got you @Warkanlock. We'll get you someone to help. Wrote to you over your post on Slack dev channel.

[staycoolcall911]

This issue seems to be blocked by #435 - see the discussion on #5609 for more details.