Package org.geotools.api.filter.sort

Interface SortBy

All Known Implementing Classes:
SortByImpl
public interface SortBy
Defines the sort order, based on a property and ascending/descending.

Having SortBy at the Filter level is an interesting undertaking of Filter 1.1 support. Why you ask? It is at the Same level as Filter, it is not *used* by Filter itself. The services that make use of Filter, such as WFS are starting to make use of SortBy in the same breath.

Where is SortBy used:

  • WFS 1.1 Query
  • CSW 2.0.1 AbstractQuery
There may be more ...

What this means is that the GeoTools Query will make use of this construct. As for sorting the result of an expression (where an expression matches more then one element), we will splice it in to AttributeExpression as an optional parameter. Note function is defined to return a single value (so we don't need to worry there).

Since:
GeoAPI 2.1
Author:
Jody Garnett (Refractions Research)
See Also:

  • Field Details

    • UNSORTED

      static final SortBy[] UNSORTED
      Used to indicate lack of a sorting order.

      This is the default value for used when setting up a Query.

    • NATURAL_ORDER

      static final SortBy NATURAL_ORDER
      Used to indicate "natural" sorting order, usually according FID (hopefully based on Key attribtues).

      This is the order that is most likely to be available in optimzied form, if an Attribute is marked as "key" an optimized ordering should be considered avaialble.

      Non optimized orderings are will at the very least require as pass through the data to bring it into memory, you can assume somekind of TreeSet would be used. Where the nodes in the tree would indicate a list of FeatureIds assoicated with the node, in the order encountered.

      This is a "NullObject".

    • REVERSE_ORDER

      static final SortBy REVERSE_ORDER
      Indicate the reverse order, usually assoicated with "Fid".

      This is a "NullObject".

  • Method Details

    • getPropertyName

      PropertyName getPropertyName()
      Indicate property to sort by, specification is limited to PropertyName.

      Not sure if this is allowed to be a xPath expression?

      • It would be consist with our use in GeoTools
      • It would not seem to agree with the short hand notation used by WFS1.1 (ie. "year A, month A, day A" )
      Returns:
      Name of property to sort by.

    • getSortOrder

      SortOrder getSortOrder()
      The the sort order - one of ASCENDING or DESCENDING.