How to recursively using sort_by and pick

[shoekstra]

Hi!

I'm trying to sort a file so that keys are sorted, key value pairs are sorted by their name value, and name is the first key in an array (when it exists). This is proving to be challenging.

I'm able to recursively sort using sort_keys, but cannot dynamically use sort_by(.name), I need to specify the path to each array that contains these key pairs -- is there a way to look this up dynamically?

Additionally I want to make name the first key in an array when present. I'm about to do this by specifying the path and |= pick(["name"] + keys | unique ) -- is it possible to do this dynamically too?

Thanks in advance!

[mikefarah]

Sure:

yq 'with(.. | select(tag == "!!seq" and length > 0 and (.[0] | has("name"))); 
    . |= (sort_by(.name) | 
    (.[] |= pick(["name"] + keys | unique)) )
)' file.yaml

Explanation:

1. Find all the arrays that have a first object with a name field .. | select(tag == "!!seq" and length > 0 and (.[0] | has("name")))
2. with those, sort them by name, and apply the pick to all the children

Hope that helps!

[mikefarah]

FWIW here is the test data I used - next time it would help me if you provided something like this:

listWithName:
  - name: zz}
  - {thing: cat, name: yyy}
  - name: aa}

emptyList: []
listOfScalars: [3]
listWithNoName:
- age: 31
- age: 2
- age: 12