[AccessD] Splitting up names

What I used to do about this what use split to break the names up, then
dim a dynamic array with 5 dimensions that I used to hold Salutation,
FirstName, MiddleName, LastName, Title.  I examined the last item in the
split array and if it was Jr, Sr, III, PhD, DDS, etc. and if so put it
into the dynamic(4).  Then I looked at the first item in the split to
see if it was a salutation like Mr, Mrs, Dr, etc. and if so, I put it
into dynamic(0).  If there was no salutation or title, the first word
(or the first after the salutation) went into firstname and the last
went into lastname, with anything left over going into middlename.  That
was handled by code--then I reviewed it all and made manual corrections.
I was working with huge mailing lists at the time, so anything that
reduced the need to manually split 50,000+ names was a huge benefit.

Charlotte Foust

-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Susan Harkins
Sent: Thursday, May 11, 2006 3:02 PM
To: 'Access Developers discussion and problem solving'
Subject: Re: [AccessD] Splitting up names

I was thinking the same thing Drew -- you can automate the split, but
with inconsistent values to start with, there's no substitute for the
human review to clean up the few that just don't fit. You might could
even flag the ones that seem inconsistent to help out a bit. 

Susan H. 

The Split() function will split them into a string array, however, the
JR and two name first names are going to be an issue.  I would create a
list of known suffixes, and then create a suffix field.  Whatever you do
is going to probably require a human to 'review' the results.


--
AccessD mailing list
AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd
Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com