Order By clause

I have a stored procdeure that runs to populate a pick-list based on several
criteria. It is set to Order By ascending by default. I have a end-user that
would like the list to return one particular value at the top each time and
then by ascending order. How do I Order By a text value then ascending?

Example:Fat,Normal,Thin,Ugly
Should return: Normal,Fat,Thin,Ugly

It should always return 'Normal' in the first position then sort the
remaining values by ascending order.

Thanks for any help...

Well, you could do something like:

....
ORDER BY
CASE (Criteria)
WHEN ('Normal') THEN 0
ELSE 1
END,
Criteria

The extra sorting column of 0 or 1 will force the 0's to the top, but keep
alphabetic order within the 0 and 1 groups.

RLF


"ChicagoPete" wrote in message

>I have a stored procdeure that runs to populate a pick-list based on
>several
> criteria. It is set to Order By ascending by default. I have a end-user
> that
> would like the list to return one particular value at the top each time
> and
> then by ascending order. How do I Order By a text value then ascending?
>
> Example:Fat,Normal,Thin,Ugly
> Should return: Normal,Fat,Thin,Ugly
>
> It should always return 'Normal' in the first position then sort the
> remaining values by ascending order.
>
> Thanks for any help...