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[Yaotzin]

In pretty much everywhere, but most annoyingly the stockpile screens, things are not sorted alphabetically. I suppose they're sorted by the order they appear in the RAWs. No matter, this is infuriating.

For example, I wanted to make a stockpile for valuable leather (giraffe, rhino, elephant etc), then another for everything else. Do you know how hard it is to actually find those items?

So, my request is that I *beg* you to make everything possible to be sorted alphabetically.

There's so much STUFF in this game - especially after all these new giant creatures. That's great, but it makes sorting a complete nightmare.

[xpi0t0s]

Definitely.  Don't know how many times I've paged through the same list maybe 3-4 times before I've found the thing I'm looking for.
It's one of the reasons I stopped playing.

[Di]

I'd say put string search into any menu bigger than 10 positions.

[Yaotzin]

I say do both?

Some of the lists are just absurdly long now. Something is badly needed. I figure it really can't be hard for Toady to do, either. The only tricky part is the game of whack-a-mole making sure every list around is sorted - and the community can do the job for him there!

[Adrian]

Alphabetic sorting of lists

String search for lists >10 positions

Both of these sound like smart additions to DF, but it also sounds like either one would make the other obsolete.
So now my question will be: "Which one would be easier to implement and require less CPU power/RAM to operate?"

[Yaotzin]

Actually you could accomplish this without changing DF's code at all, I believe. You could simply write a script to edit all the RAWs to make all the entries in alphabetical order. The game then loads them up as they appear, and tada, they're in order already.

In game it would take utterly trivial amounts of processing power, and would only happen when you actually load the list - so no impact on overall FPS.

Searching can be useful even with alphabetical lists in cases where the list is genuinely huge, as some of them are becoming. Or if your a-b-c's are really bad

[peskyninja]

Alphabetic sorting of lists

String search for lists >10 positions

Both of these sound like smart additions to DF, but it also sounds like either one would make the other obsolete.
So now my question will be: "Which one would be easier to implement and require less CPU power/RAM to operate?"

They won't use almost any Computing power. (Compared to temp checks, pathing, kittens, mists....) As the game won't need to constantly search/check for information, they'll be activated only when the player needs to search for something.

[Sphalerite]

Actually you could accomplish this without changing DF's code at all, I believe. You could simply write a script to edit all the RAWs to make all the entries in alphabetical order. The game then loads them up as they appear, and tada, they're in order already.

Heh.  I just did this - before even coming across this thread.  I haven't created a fortress with that build yet, so I have yet to see how well it works.

[Yaotzin]

On second thought it might only partially alphabetize things, if the game reads one RAW at a time.

Regardless, it's such an ugly hack of a solution. Toady needs to fix it properly :>

[King Mir]

It's nice having some things, like gems, sorted by value.

[AWdeV]

But alphabetically is hardly important. Sorting by value or by weight makes more sense as that has an actual impact on things that aren't OCD.

[Sphalerite]

But alphabetically is hardly important. Sorting by value or by weight makes more sense as that has an actual impact on things that aren't OCD.

Spoken like someone who has never tried to make a refuse stockpile that only accepts corpses from specific creatures.

[Aachen]

Yeah. And same goes for animal-butchery products. In general, I'd think extending the "filter-on-string" approach is more generally helpful, but even being able to cycle through several different sorting methods would simplify a lot of the waste-work with regard to lists.

[Yaotzin]

Yep, as I said in the OP, this was started by me trying to find elephant+giraffe+rhino leather in the stockpile list. The thing is hideous.

Being able to search is great too. Sort by value or weight could be useful too.

So I say have them all. Default to alphabetically, able to change to value or weight, and with a search option. Please Toady Please!

[irmo]

Yep, as I said in the OP, this was started by me trying to find elephant+giraffe+rhino leather in the stockpile list. The thing is hideous.

Being able to search is great too. Sort by value or weight could be useful too.

So I say have them all. Default to alphabetically, able to change to value or weight, and with a search option. Please Toady Please!

How about just condensing the various leathers into a smaller number of categories? I mean, if you saw a piece of leather, would you be able to say whether it's elephant or rhino? Does it ever make a difference, then, besides that an elephant produces more of it?