sortOn package:xmonad-contrib

Sort a list by comparing the results of a key function applied to each element. sortOn f is equivalent to sortBy (comparing f), but has the performance advantage of only evaluating f once for each element in the input list. This is called the decorate-sort-undecorate paradigm, or Schwartzian transform. Elements are arranged from lowest to highest, keeping duplicates in the order they appeared in the input. The argument must be finite.

Examples

>>> sortOn fst [(2, "world"), (4, "!"), (1, "Hello")]
[(1,"Hello"),(2,"world"),(4,"!")]
>>> sortOn length ["jim", "creed", "pam", "michael", "dwight", "kevin"]
["jim","pam","creed","kevin","dwight","michael"]