What is the purpose of this table?

[MissP.25_5]

I am learning scheme programming.
What is the result of this?

(define (small a b)
(string<? (first a) (first b))

And the list is (list "apple" "100 yen").

What is the first a and what is the first b? Is it "a" and "1"? If so, between these two, which is lesser?

 

[rcgldr]

Assuming ascii, then '1' is less than 'a'.

 

[Willy_B]

When you compare strings you use alphabetical order, or ASCII values of the characters.

numerals ( 0 1 ...) < UPPER CASE LETTERS < lower case letters

 

[MissP.25_5]

When you compare strings you use alphabetical order, or ASCII values of the characters.

numerals ( 0 1 ...) < UPPER CASE LETTERS < lower case letters

But here we have both numbers and letters. How do you compare a and 1?

 

[Willy_B]

http://www.ascii.cl/htmlcodes.htm

Here is a table.