How can I alphabetize within a <textarea>? JavaScript sort()?

Question

I've seen a few sites now that alphabetize what ever you put in their textarea I was wondering what I would have to do in order to add a button to mine that would produce that? I'm guessing the "JavaScript sort()" function, but I really don't know. All I've seen with that so far is using it to alphabetize arrays. This would be for anything entered, per line, in an open textarea. Any ideas?

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Answer 1

split the string into an array, sort it, then join it back together:

var textarea = document.getElementById("theTextareaId"); // or whatever...
textarea.value = textarea.value.split("\n").sort().join("\n");