External sort compo?

[Antoni Gual]

Isn't there a way you could read some larger chunks, like maybe 4000 bytes, to reduce the number of reads down to 1000?

Of course you would have to parse these chunks in 4 byte increments and convert each 4 bytes to a long variable, and then store them into the s1 array. Would this be difficult? Assuming you have an extra 4000 bytes in your program's memory, wouldn't that increase the speed?

Unfortunately QB can only GET simple variables.
The only way to reduce the number of gets would be to use a 32K string, then move the values to the array with CVL(MID$ ) in a loop. I don't know if it would increase the speed , because of the overhead in using a string function as MID$. I should try it..

BTW: FB can read a complete array in a single operation, this makes it fast!