Saturday, February 16, 2013

For some reason I thought that taking each US State, alphabetizing the letters in its name, and then re-alphabetizing all the states would be interesting.  Here are the results:

State
Alphabetized State Name
Alabama
aaaablm
Alaska
aaakls
Arkansas
aaaknrss
Nebraska
aabeknrs
Massachusetts
aacehmssssttu
California
aacfilnor
North Carolina
aachilnnoorrt
South Carolina
aachilnoorstu
Delaware
aadeelrw
Nevada
aadenv
North Dakota
aadhknoortt
South Dakota
aadhkoosttu
Indiana
aadiinn
Maryland
aadlmnry
Pennsylvania
aaeilnnnpsvy
Hawaii
aahiiw
Oklahoma
aahklmoo
Louisiana
aaiilnosu
Arizona
aainorz
Kansas
aaknss
Montana
aamnnot
Colorado
acdlrooo
Michigan
acghiimn
Rhode Island
addehlinors
Florida
adfilor
Idaho
adhio
New Hampshire
aeehhimnprsw
Georgia
aeggior
Minnesota
aeimnnost
Texas
aestx
Washington
aghinnostw
Virginia
agiiinrv
Utah
ahtu
Maine
aimne
Iowa
aiow
Connecticut
ccceinnottu
New Mexico
ceeimnowx
Kentucky
cekkntuy
Wisconsin
ciinnossw
West Virginia
eagiiinrstvw
Tennessee
eeeennsst
New Jersey
eeejnrswy
Oregon
egnoor
New York
eknorwy
Vermont
emnortv
Wyoming
gimnowy
Ohio
hioo
Mississippi
iiiimppssss
Illinois
iiillnos
Missouri
iimorssu

The outcome isn't as interesting as I had hoped.  With the letters in their names alphabetized, the vast majority of the states start with 'a'.  In fact, only six states even start with consonants.  That's pretty boring, I think.  Somehow, Missouri ended up at the end of the list.  I don't find that very interesting either.

The most interesting part of the exercise was learning what states are easy to alphabetize and which aren't. Ohio, Idaho, Tennessee, Mississippi?  Easy to alphabetize.  Pennsylvania and North Carolina take a little more thought.

I hope you can find more value in this table than I did.


No comments:

Post a Comment