javascript - sort a dictionary (or whatever key-value data structure in js) on word_number keys efficiently

Question

how do I sort a dictionary by key like

dict["word_21"] = "Hello Java";
dict["word_22"] = "Hello World";
dict["word_11"] = "Hello Javascript";

so that I get

dict["word_22"] = "Hello World";
dict["word_21"] = "Hello Java";
dict["word_11"] = "Hello Javascript";

There are word_number combinations on indices only and the values are strings. The indices are distinct (no equal values) but could be "undefined" in an error case

Edit: Actually I need the descending and ascending order of it. But the descending order is what I need at the moment.

Answer 1

Try this

var sorted = [];
for(var key in dict) {
    sorted[sorted.length] = key;
}
sorted.sort();

Sorting dict on its keys and writing it back to the object does not make sense to me, but here it goes:

function sortOnKeys(dict) {

    var sorted = [];
    for(var key in dict) {
        sorted[sorted.length] = key;
    }
    sorted.sort();

    var tempDict = {};
    for(var i = 0; i < sorted.length; i++) {
        tempDict[sorted[i]] = dict[sorted[i]];
    }

    return tempDict;
}

dict = sortOnKeys(dict);