Is this safe to use sort utilities in 17.4 version

If you don't want to get into complexity of compatibility of plugin, you can use below code.
Here I am giving you an example to sort data based on datatype.
Below example is of year sorting. (Integer)
=========================================
create a rule named getYearObject

code....
{year:ri!year}

input...
year (number integer)
=========================================
create a parent rule named getYearObjectArray

code...
a!foreach(
items:ri!years,
expression:rule!getYearObject(fv!item)
)

input...
years (number integer) multiple
=========================================
In your master rule write below code.
For understanding I am writing code step by step.

local!yearDummyData:{2011,2012,2002,2014},
local!pagingInfo:a!pagingInfo(startIndex:1, batchSize:-1 sort: a!sortInfo(field: "year",ascending: true()))
local!yearObjects:rule!getYearObjectArray(years:local!yearDummyData),
local!sortedYears:todatasubset(local!yearObjects,local!pagingInfo),
local!answer:index(local!sortedYears.data,"year",{})

Hope this works as standalone code.

Regards,
Mayur Mondhe