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diff --git a/src/org/apache/commons/codec/StringEncoderComparator.java b/src/org/apache/commons/codec/StringEncoderComparator.java
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+/*
+ * Copyright 2001-2004 The Apache Software Foundation.
+ * 
+ * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+ * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+ * You may obtain a copy of the License at
+ * 
+ *      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+ * 
+ * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+ * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+ * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+ * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+ * limitations under the License.
+ */ 
+
+package org.apache.commons.codec;
+
+import java.util.Comparator;
+
+/**
+ * Strings are comparable, and this comparator allows 
+ * you to configure it with an instance of a class
+ * which implements StringEncoder.  This comparator
+ * is used to sort Strings by an encoding scheme such
+ * as Soundex, Metaphone, etc.  This class can come in
+ * handy if one need to sort Strings by an encoded
+ * form of a name such as Soundex.
+ *
+ * @author Apache Software Foundation
+ * @version $Id: StringEncoderComparator.java,v 1.14 2004/06/21 23:24:17 ggregory Exp $
+ */
+public class StringEncoderComparator implements Comparator {
+
+    /**
+     * Internal encoder instance.
+     */
+    private StringEncoder stringEncoder;
+
+    /**
+     * Constructs a new instance.
+     */
+    public StringEncoderComparator() {
+        // no init.
+    }
+
+    /**
+     * Constructs a new instance with the given algorithm.
+     * @param stringEncoder the StringEncoder used for comparisons.
+     */
+    public StringEncoderComparator(StringEncoder stringEncoder) {
+        this.stringEncoder = stringEncoder;
+    }
+
+    /**
+     * Compares two strings based not on the strings 
+     * themselves, but on an encoding of the two 
+     * strings using the StringEncoder this Comparator
+     * was created with.
+     * 
+     * If an {@link EncoderException} is encountered, return <code>0</code>.
+     * 
+     * @param o1 the object to compare
+     * @param o2 the object to compare to
+     * @return the Comparable.compareTo() return code or 0 if an encoding error was caught.
+     * @see Comparable
+     */
+    public int compare(Object o1, Object o2) {
+
+        int compareCode = 0;
+
+        try {
+            Comparable s1 = (Comparable) ((Encoder) this.stringEncoder).encode(o1);
+            Comparable s2 = (Comparable) ((Encoder) this.stringEncoder).encode(o2);
+            compareCode = s1.compareTo(s2);
+        } 
+        catch (EncoderException ee) {
+            compareCode = 0;
+        }
+        return compareCode;
+    }
+
+}