Returns a value that specifies the sequence of the sort order in text for string comparison or sorting (Microsoft Jet workspaces only).
Return Values
The return value is a Long value or constant that can be one of the following values.
| Constant | Sort order |
| dbSortGeneral | General (English, French, German, Portuguese, Italian, and Modern Spanish) |
| dbSortArabic | Arabic |
| dbSortChineseSimplified | Simplified Chinese |
| dbSortChineseTraditional | Traditional Chinese |
| dbSortCyrillic | Russian |
| dbSortCzech | Czech |
| dbSortDutch | Dutch |
| dbSortGreek | Greek |
| dbSortHebrew | Hebrew |
| dbSortHungarian | Hungarian |
| dbSortIcelandic | Icelandic |
| dbSortJapanese | Japanese |
| dbSortKorean | Korean |
| dbSortNeutral | Neutral |
| dbSortNorwDan | Norwegian or Danish |
| dbSortPDXIntl | Paradox International |
| dbSortPDXNor | Paradox Norwegian or Danish |
| dbSortPDXSwe | Paradox Swedish or Finnish |
| dbSortPolish | Polish |
| dbSortSlovenian | Slovenian |
| dbSortSpanish | Spanish |
| dbSortSwedFin | Swedish or Finnish |
| dbSortThai | Thai |
| dbSortTurkish | Turkish |
| dbSortUndefined | Undefined or unknown |
Remarks
The availability of the CollatingOrder property depends on the object that contains the Fields collection, as shown in the following table.
| If the Fields collection belongs to an | Then CollatingOrder is |
| Index object | Not supported |
| QueryDef object | Read-only |
| Recordset object | Read-only |
| Relation object | Not supported |
| TableDef object | Read-only |
The CollatingOrder property setting corresponds to the locale argument of the CreateDatabase method when the database was created or the CompactDatabase method when the database was most recently compacted.
Check the CollatingOrder property setting of a Database or Field object to determine the string comparison method for the database or field. You can set the CollatingOrder property of a new, unappended Field object if you want the setting of the Field object to differ from that of the Database object that contains it.
The CollatingOrder and Attributes property settings of a Field object in a Fields collection of an Index object together determine the sequence and direction of the sort order in an index. However, you can't set a collating order for an individual index—you can only set it for an entire table.