But every organization system has its cost, and it's probably not worth it for small collections (like a stack of papers).
The professors I've seen attempt to do this just put each paper into piles sorted by last name, and then search among that pile for a specific name when needed. It's an old-fashioned indexing system.
More specifically, classifications: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_classification
(of which Dewey is one of the more famous ones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dewey_Decimal_Classification
But every organization system has its cost, and it's probably not worth it for small collections (like a stack of papers).
The professors I've seen attempt to do this just put each paper into piles sorted by last name, and then search among that pile for a specific name when needed. It's an old-fashioned indexing system.
There's also this old metafilter thread; several people there mention a "sort-all" device: https://ask.metafilter.com/222379/Quickest-way-to-alphebatiz...