A-Z sorting is different between two excel files

Question

I'm working on merging two datasets on python; however, I'm running into a sorting issue while preparing the excel files for processing.

Excel 1 sorts AZ of project ID's as:
1
2.a
2.b
3

However, excel 2 sorts AZ as:
1
3
2.a
2.b

How do I make sure they both sort as excel 1?

I've changed format of columns from General to number for both and it's still similar outcome.

Answer 1

IMHO, sorting is unnecessary. u want:

merging two datasets on python

Thus, just import/merge both data 1st.. then sort in python.. just from looking in the output file you can see if some of the row label IS actually different. Eg: "2.a" vs "2.a "