As some icing on this topic, you can remember the meaning of what cmp() returns like this: cmp(a, b) < 0 means a < b cmp(a, b) == 0 means a == b cmp(a, b) != 0 means a != b cmp(a, b) > 0 means a > b ... Get the pattern? Works for C's strcmp() too. ## Jason Orendorff http://www.jorendorff.com/