order by, group by question

Hi,

I have this query that I need to refine a little but am unsure how to do it. Basicall i need to sort it a specific way and I cam across a resultset that gave me problems. The best way to describe the problem is to show u the resultset that gave me problems:

productid classid type age
5000       12       A     30
5000       12       A     30
5000       12       A     31
5000       12       A     31

this query will is ordered by 1,2,4 (and normally the resultset wont all have the same productid and classid, but in this case it does). What i need is to have the age be 30, 31, 30,31. Can this be done by a group by clause? I'm not very familiar with it, can u post some code.
Thanks

for the specific example you have shown, no it cannot be done

with all the other columns being equal, you are basically left with only two ORDER BY options for the age column: ascending or descending

there is no ORDER BY alternating

rudy
http://r937.com/

And there is no GROUP BY clause that will work?

Thanks

i'm pretty sure there isn't, although if you give a more realistic example...

Thats as realistic as I can get for this one because this is exactly what my resultset is.

Thanks

well, if we weren't talking about sql, but rather in plain english, how would you describe sorting 27, 28, 28, 29, 29, 30, 31, 31?

what sequence would you like those in?

i mean, your unusual sequencing (alternating?) just ain't gonna happen with a simple ORDER BY

sorry, but please don't shoot the messenger

Sorry, perhaps i should have mentioned that there will never be more than 2 different ages(ie: it will never be 28,28,29,29,30,30..)
Only two ages.