[dba-VB] Client question!

jwcolby jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com
Wed Jun 9 07:38:30 CDT 2010


I'm thinking that you should preprocess to get the name standardized.  Assuming that O Tool is not a 
valid name, process the name (in the table) such that O Tool is replaced with O'Tool and OTool is 
replaced with O'Tool and then teach the user that there are ' in names.

OTOH... As I cruise email and the internet I constantly see people replace lose with loose (I will 
loose my sanity) so I am not convinced that there is a solution for your problem.  There is no 
substitute for the ability to think.

I actually had a name substitution library that I contributed to which does what you are talking 
about.  It was a rather extensive collection of the hyphenated names culled from huge name lists. 
And of course I cannot find it anymore.  Sigh.

The concept is that you build a substitution table and then just search the substitution table.  I 
have searched and searched and simply cannot find it now.

John W. Colby
www.ColbyConsulting.com


Michael Maddison wrote:
> Ugly, yes.
> It will be war on hyphens next. 
> 
> I guess this will work.
> WHERE Surname like '%' + @search + '%' OR	--The can spell way
> 	  replace( Surname,'''','') like '%' + replace(@search,' ','') +
> '%' 
> 
> Michael M
> 
> 
> The obvious would be to do a replace on ' and space and then compare
> against names pre-stripped.
> 
> Ugly in any case.
> 
> John W. Colby
> www.ColbyConsulting.com
> 
> 
> Michael Maddison wrote:
>> Hi Guys,
>>
>>  
>>
>> It's late at night and I really don't know how to respond to this
>> request...
>>
>>  
>>
>> "Currently for a name such as O'Tool you have to enter in the ' to get
>> the name to come up, is it possible to get the search to recognise a
>> name such as this when options such as O Tool or Otool are put in by
> the
>> user"
>>
>>  
>>
>> My 1st reaction was to laugh, should I be crying?
>>
>> I think I'd have to do a replace on the field side of the where
>> clause... I'd have to do a replace for each scenario I think.
>>
>>  
>>
>> Ideas?
>>
>>  
>>
>> Cheers
>>
>>  
>>
>> Michael M




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