Apps :: Bash: "sort" does not sort



If I enter the following code to sort a file with columns separated by colons,
Code Sample
sort -t: -k 4 file.file

the result is that the file is sorted by the third field. In fact, it does not seem to matter which field I identify after the -k option. It sorts every time by the third field.

In another file with fixed length columns, I tried the code
Code Sample
sort -k 4 file.file

and the result was the same regardless of which column I sorted by.

What am I doing wrong? What other information can I provide to help identify the problem?

Thank you in advance.

Works ok for me on this file:
Quote
a:b:i:j
1:h:c:z
n:2:3:4


Post an example of the data in your file.

The data is phone numbers, names, and dates. Example...
Quote
231:432:4550:Mooney:Albert:P:09-23-1945
231:432:5679:Ludlow:Q-Dog:G:10-15-2007

It works for me, too - in Ubuntu.

My version is DSL 4.2.4

I take it you have loaded gnuutils.dsl?

If

$ ls -l /usr/bin/sort

shows a link to Busybox, then you are using Busybox's sort, which has a greatly reduced option set.

Awesome help! Thank you.
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