Ask HN: Why does JavaScript sort() order numerical arrays alphabetically?

1 pointmaest1 comment

As you may or may not know:

    >>> [100,11].sort()
    Array [ 100, 11 ]

From the Moz dev docs[0]:

"The default sort order is ascending, built upon converting the elements into strings, then comparing their sequences of UTF-16 code units values."

I find this: 1. surprising: I am not aware of any other languages that do this. 2. inefficient: sort() converts everything into a string first.

I've looked around but could not find any discussions about _why_ this choice was made. Can anyone share any insight on this design decision?

On a more personal note, I have just wasted a considerable amount of time chasing a bug caused by incorrect usage of sort().

[0]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Array/sort