Well, since you're asking, I'll elaborate. Most of you guys here deal with land. Well, I deal with taking the land you guys set up and ripping it apart into individual lots. Each object I'm selecting here is a lot number. I've never seen a negative lot number, a real number or one's with letters contained in them, so I'm not too worried about getting lettered, negative or real numbered strings.
Here's the entire job that is happening with this routine. Certain things are set up before hand, like separating each individual lot and setting objects on specific layers. The layer of the lot numbers is, LOTNO2. Don't ask. Enter the routine. I call it Super Write Block. It runs a page setup, sets the limits of the page, inserts a titleblock specific to certain city requirements and selects each object on LOTNO2, sorts them, zooms to the center of each lot, one at a time. It then allows the user to select the lot and other objects, moves them to the middle of the titleblock, allows the user to move the objects to fit better. When the user hits enter, the routine moves the lot number to the upper right corner of the titleblock, moves a predefined north arrow into a block where it belongs, then reads a txt file, looking for a match of the lot number with whatever line it finds, then reads the next line as the lot address and puts it in place where it belongs and many other things. When all is finished, it should plot it and then write block it out using the lot number as the drawing name, i.e 01.dwg. To keep all the drawings sorted, I use C for any drawing < 9 and > 100. For 100 > I use L. Haven't had to worry about 1000, yet.
As far as this function goes, it takes all the objects that have been selected and sorts them based on their lot number. I think the problem I'm having with speed has to do with converting ename's to vla-objects, then sorting, then re-selecting ename's by their sort order and re-converting them to vla-objects. I think I know what I need to do, but when you spend all day looking at something, it's nice to get some fresh ideas from others. Thank you all for your input and ideas. I like them all.