javascript - How to sort an array of objects by date?

Question

I am trying to sort an array of objects with each object containing:

var recent = [{id: "123",age :12,start: "10/17/13 13:07"} , {id: "13",age :62,start: "07/30/13 16:30"}];

Date format is: mm/dd/yy hh:mm.

I want to sort in order of date with the most recent first. If date is same it should be sorted by their time parts.

I tried out the below sort() function, but it is not working:

recent.sort(function(a,b))
{
    a = new Date(a.start);
    b = new Date(b.start);
    return a-b;
});

Also how should I iterate over the objects for sorting? Something like:

for (var i = 0; i < recent.length; i++)
    {
        recent[i].start.sort(function (a, b)
        {
            a = new Date(a.start);
            b = new Date(b.start);
            return a-b; 
        } );
    }

There can be any number of objects in the array.

Answer 1

As has been pointed out in the comments, the definition of recent isn't correct javascript.

But assuming the dates are strings:

var recent = [
    {id: 123,age :12,start: "10/17/13 13:07"}, 
    {id: 13,age :62,start: "07/30/13 16:30"}
];

then sort like this:

recent.sort(function(a,b) { 
    return new Date(a.start).getTime() - new Date(b.start).getTime() 
});

More details on sort function from W3Schools