Sort vs. Sought — What's the Difference?
Difference Between Sort and Sought
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Compare with Definitions
Sort
A group of persons or things of the same general character; a kind. See Usage Note at kind2.
Sought
Past tense and past participle of seek.
Sort
Character or nature
Books of a subversive sort.
Sought
Simple past tense and past participle of seek
Sort
One that exemplifies the characteristics of or serves a similar function to another
"A large dinner-party ... made a sort of general introduction for her to the society of the neighbourhood" (George Eliot).
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Sought
That is looked for;
The long sought relatives
Sort
A person; an individual
The clerk is a decent sort.
Sought
Being searched for;
The most sought-after item was the silver candelabrum
Sort
(Computers) An operation that arranges data in a specified way
Did an alphabetic sort on the columns of data.
Sort
(Archaic) A way of acting or behaving
"in this sort the simple household lived / From day to day" (William Wordsworth).
Sort
To place or arrange according to class, kind, or size; classify
Sorted the books into boxes by genre.
Sort
To separate from others
Sort the wheat from the chaff.
Sort
To make a search or examination of a collection of things
Sorted through the laundry looking for a matching sock.
Sort
To be or become arranged in a certain way.
Sort
A general type.
Sort
Manner; form of being or acting.
Sort
(obsolete) Condition above the vulgar; rank.
Sort
(informal) A person evaluated in a certain way (bad, good, strange, etc.).
Sort
(dated) Group, company.
Sort
A good-looking woman.
Sort
An act of sorting.
I had a sort of my cupboard.
Sort
(computing) An algorithm for sorting a list of items into a particular sequence.
Popular algorithms for sorts include quicksort and heapsort.
Sort
(typography) A piece of metal type used to print one letter, character, or symbol in a particular size and style.
Sort
(mathematics) A type.
Sort
(obsolete) Chance; lot; destiny.
Sort
(obsolete) A full set of anything, such as a pair of shoes, or a suit of clothes.
Sort
(transitive) To separate items into different categories according to certain criteria that determine their sorts.
Sort the letters in those bags into a separate pile for each language.
Sort
(transitive) To arrange into some sequence, usually numerically, alphabetically or chronologically.
Sort those bells into a row in ascending sequence of pitch.
Sort
(transitive) To conjoin; to put together in distribution; to class.
Sort
To conform; to adapt; to accommodate.
Sort
To choose from a number; to select; to cull.
Sort
(intransitive) To join or associate with others, especially with others of the same kind or species; to agree.
Sort
(intransitive) To suit; to fit; to be in accord; to harmonize.
Sort
To fix (a problem) or handle (a task).
Sort
To attack physically.
If he comes nosing around here again I'll sort him!
Sort
(transitive) To geld.
Sort
Chance; lot; destiny.
By aventure, or sort, or cas [chance].
Let blockish Ajax drawThe sort to fight with Hector.
Sort
A kind or species; any number or collection of individual persons or things characterized by the same or like qualities; a class or order; as, a sort of men; a sort of horses; a sort of trees; a sort of poems.
Sort
Manner; form of being or acting.
Which for my part I covet to perform,In sort as through the world I did proclaim.
Flowers, in such sort worn, can neither be smelt nor seen well by those that wear them.
I'll deceive you in another sort.
To Adam in what sortShall I appear?
I shall not be wholly without praise, if in some sort I have copied his style.
Sort
Condition above the vulgar; rank.
Sort
A chance group; a company of persons who happen to be together; a troop; also, an assemblage of animals.
A boy, a child, and we a sort of us,Vowed against his voyage.
Sort
A pair; a set; a suit.
Sort
Letters, figures, points, marks, spaces, or quadrats, belonging to a case, separately considered.
As when the total kindOf birds, in orderly array on wing,Came summoned over Eden to receiveTheir names of there.
None of noble sortWould so offend a virgin.
Sort
To separate, and place in distinct classes or divisions, as things having different qualities; as, to sort cloths according to their colors; to sort wool or thread according to its fineness.
Rays which differ in refrangibility may be parted and sorted from one another.
Sort
To reduce to order from a confused state.
Sort
To conjoin; to put together in distribution; to class.
Shellfish have been, by some of the ancients, compared and sorted with insects.
She sorts things present with things past.
Sort
To choose from a number; to select; to cull.
That he may sort out a worthy spouse.
I'll sort some other time to visit you.
Sort
To conform; to adapt; to accommodate.
I pray thee, sort thy heart to patience.
Sort
To join or associate with others, esp. with others of the same kind or species; to agree.
Nor do metals only sort and herd with metals in the earth, and minerals with minerals.
The illiberality of parents towards children makes them base, and sort with any company.
Sort
To suit; to fit; to be in accord; to harmonize.
They are happy whose natures sort with their vocations.
Things sort not to my will.
I can not tell you precisely how they sorted.
Sort
A category of things distinguished by some common characteristic or quality;
Sculpture is a form of art
What kinds of desserts are there?
Sort
An approximate definition or example;
She wore a sort of magenta dress
She served a creamy sort of dessert thing
Sort
A person of a particular character or nature;
What sort of person is he?
He's a good sort
Sort
An operation that segregates items into groups according to a specified criterion;
The bottleneck in mail delivery it the process of sorting
Sort
Examine in order to test suitability;
Screen these samples
Screen the job applicants
Sort
Arrange or order by classes or categories;
How would you classify these pottery shards--are they prehistoric?
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