RANKSORT(1)                        |STAT                  November 28, 1986

NAME
     ranksort - rank order columns

SYNOPSIS
     ranksort [-r] [-l lines]

DESCRIPTION
     _r_a_n_k_s_o_r_t reads the lines from the standard input and rank orders each
     column.  Blank lines are ignored.  Ties share the ranks, so if the
     13th and 14th ranked numbers are equal, then each will be assigned the
     rank 13.5.

     _r_a_n_k_s_o_r_t is used on data when the assumptions for procedures like the
     normal theory Pearson correlation coefficient are suspected to be
     false.  Under such conditions, the Spearman rho rank order correlation
     coefficient is more appropriate.  The Spearman rho is equal to the
     Pearson calculation on the data converted to ranks.  The normal theory
     (F or t) significance test of the correlation coefficient is a good
     approximation to the two tailed test of the rank order correlation
     when the number of pairs is greater than 10.  For smaller samples, a
     table should be consulted.

OPTIONS
     -l lines
          Set the maximum number of lines to be read.

     -r   Reverse the order of the rankings.  By default, rank orderings
          correlate with input data so that smaller numbers get smaller
          rank order values.

EXAMPLE
       Input                    Output
       0    5    0    2         1    6    1    5.5
       1    6    10   3         2    7    2    7.5
       2    7    20   3         3    8    3    7.5
       3    8    30   4         4    9    4    9.5
       4    9    40   4         5    10   5    9.5
       5    0    50   0         6    1    6    1.5
       6    1    60   0         7    2    7    1.5
       7    2    70   1         8    3    8    3.5
       8    3    80   1         9    4    9    3.5
       9    4    90   2         10   5    10   5.5

LIMITS
     Use the -L option to determine the program limits.

SEE ALSO
     rankrel(1) and rankind(1) perform rank order statistics.
