iOS sort an NSArray of Time NSString's

Question

I need to sort an NSArray containing time NSString\'s such as,

NSMutableArray *times = [[NSMutableArray alloc]initWithObjects:@\"09         


        

Answer 1

As these are strings it will be sored as

01:15, 12:25, 05:00....

And they are not either NSDate.

So you need to do is that Create a parallel array having NSDate from these strings, sort the array, and extract these values.

---

While implementing I solved it by novice-way

NSMutableArray *times = [[NSMutableArray alloc]initWithObjects:@"09:00 AM",@"07:30 AM",@"06:45 PM",@"05:00 PM",@"12:45 AM",@"12:45 PM",@"01:00 AM",@"01:15 PM", nil];

NSMutableArray *dates=[NSMutableArray new];

NSDateFormatter *dateFormatter=[NSDateFormatter new];
[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"hh:mm a"];

for (NSString *stringDate in times) {
        NSDate *date=[dateFormatter dateFromString:stringDate];
        [dates addObject:date];
}

NSSortDescriptor *descriptor = [[NSSortDescriptor alloc] initWithKey:@"self" ascending:YES];
NSArray *descriptors = [NSArray arrayWithObject: descriptor];
NSArray *reverseOrder = [dates sortedArrayUsingDescriptors:descriptors];

[times removeAllObjects];
for (NSDate *date in reverseOrder) {
        NSString *string=[dateFormatter stringFromDate:date];
        [times addObject:string];
}

NSLog(@"%@",times);