Disclosed herein is a platform for translating various user input into a standardized input used to cause a database to sort data in a specified manner and present the data in a graphic user interface according to user instruction. User input is a text string that includes a first set of characters and a second set of characters split by a dividing symbol. Based on the choice of dividing symbol and the arrangement of the first set of character and second set of characters the system converts the input into a standardized form.