Sort data in Pandas dataframe alphabetically

Question

I have a dataframe where I need to sort the contents of one column (comma separated) alphabetically:

ID   Data
1     Mo,Ab,ZZz
2     Ab,Ma,Bt
3     Xe,Aa
4     Xe,Re,Fi,Ab

Output:

ID   Data
1     Ab,Mo,ZZz
2     Ab,Bt,Ma
3     Aa,Xe
4     Ab,Fi,Re,Xe

I have tried:

df.sort_values(by='Data')

But this does not work

Answer 1

You can split, sorting and then join back:

df['Data'] = df['Data'].apply(lambda x: ','.join(sorted(x.split(','))))

Or use list comprehension alternative:

df['Data'] = [','.join(sorted(x.split(','))) for x in df['Data']]

---

print (df)
   ID         Data
0   1    Ab,Mo,ZZz
1   2     Ab,Bt,Ma
2   3        Aa,Xe
3   4  Ab,Fi,Re,Xe