How to sort an alphanumeric column with different lengths in MySQL?

Let us first create a table −

mysql> create table DemoTable1623     -> (     -> StudentCode varchar(20)     -> ); Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.47 sec)

Insert some records in the table using insert command −

mysql> insert into DemoTable1623 values('STU-MIT-143'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.19 sec) mysql> insert into DemoTable1623 values('STU-MIT-10'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.14 sec) mysql> insert into DemoTable1623 values('STU-MIT-150'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.21 sec) mysql> insert into DemoTable1623 values('STU-MIT-148'); Query OK, 1 row affected (0.22 sec)

Display all records from the table using select statement −

mysql> select * from DemoTable1623; 

This will produce the following output −

+-------------+ | StudentCode | +-------------+ | STU-MIT-143 | | STU-MIT-10  | | STU-MIT-150 | | STU-MIT-148 | +-------------+ 4 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Here is the query to sort an alphanumeric column with different lengths in MySQL.

mysql> select * from DemoTable1623     -> order by substring_index(StudentCode, '-', 1),     -> substring_index(StudentCode, '-', -1) + 0;

This will produce the following output −

+-------------+ | StudentCode | +-------------+ | STU-MIT-10  | | STU-MIT-143 | | STU-MIT-148 | | STU-MIT-150 | +-------------+ 4 rows in set (0.00 sec)