Currently the ordering of the networking menu is basically completely random. The only thing that's reliable is that if you are currently connected, the current connection is at the top. This makes it very hard to locate the network that you want to connect to.

There are a number of factors that we might potentially want to take into account..

 - Name (alphabetical ordering - use GLib.utf8_collate())
 - Have you connected to the network before
 - Do you have a NM connection object for the network (not the same as the previous - accidentally trying to connect to a network by clicking on the wrong menu item will create a network object with a timestamp of 0. Timestamp of 0 is also used for imported connections from NM 0.8)
 - Strength of signal. (If we use strength of signal, we'd want it to be a static snapshot when the menu is popped up. Strength of signal varies rapidly, and having a menu reshuffle is no fun.)
 - Whether the network is encrypted or not. (nm-applet prefers encrypted networks to try and discourage people from clicking on open networks that are there for evil purposes just because they are at the top of the list. Not sure if that actually works.)

But basically anything is better than random, and I'd like to get "anything" in for 3.0.1. I'll attach a quick hack of a patch that I did a while ago, might be good enough, though there's an interaction with fixing the menu not to vanish when an access point is added.