Inconsistent Search with Asterisk Names

[Andreas Hallenberg]

Hi,

I've been using an asterisk symbol to indicate which of multiple first names is the primary first name, for example, Karl* Emil Johansson.

However, if I search for the name in the search form using "First name: Karl Emil" and "Last name: Johansson" (without the asterisk), the search function doesn't find the person.

Interestingly, the search does work if I search using only the primary first name (the one originally marked with the asterisk) and the last name – for example, searching for "First name: Karl" and "Last name: Johansson" does find the person.

This seems to indicate that the search function might be able to handle the stored asterisk correctly when only the primary name is searched, but it fails when trying to match both first names if the asterisk isn't included in the search terms.

Is there any way to fix this behavior so that searching for "Karl Emil Johansson" also finds the entry "Karl* Emil Johansson"?

Best regards,
Andreas

[Rob Severijns]

Andreas,

What happens if you use "Soundex of" or "Metaphone of" as a search parameter?

[Leif Sweden]

I use capital letters for the primary first name (KARL Emil Johansson) which works fine when searching etc.

[Andreas Hallenberg]

4 hours ago, Rob Severijns said:

Andreas,

What happens if you use "Soundex of" or "Metaphone of" as a search parameter?

Unfortunately no, I tried it but it still doesn't work. Thanks for the tip though.

[Andreas Hallenberg]

3 hours ago, Leif Sweden said:

I use capital letters for the primary first name (KARL Emil Johansson) which works fine when searching etc.

Thanks for the suggestions, and yes, that could have been an option if I'd thought of it sooner. Now I've used the asterisk solution on too many people to change it for everyone.

[Leif Sweden]

1 hour ago, Andreas Hallenberg said:

Thanks for the suggestions, and yes, that could have been an option if I'd thought of it sooner. Now I've used the asterisk solution on too many people to change it for everyone.

I understand

[GOGGS]

A couple of options 

1. You could use a query from phpMyAdmin to change all the names at once, replacing anything with an asterisk with the same minus the asterisk and all in CAPS, or

2. Since the asterisk char is a special one in SQL, that's likely your issue. To overcome, search for:

karl% emil 

the % char in SQL is a placeholder that means any or no character in that position.

 

GOGGS

[Andreas Hallenberg]

2 hours ago, GOGGS said:

A couple of options 

1. You could use a query from phpMyAdmin to change all the names at once, replacing anything with an asterisk with the same minus the asterisk and all in CAPS, or

2. Since the asterisk char is a special one in SQL, that's likely your issue. To overcome, search for:

karl% emil 

the % char in SQL is a placeholder that means any or no character in that position.

 

GOGGS

Thanks for your response and suggestions. Using SQL proved to be a good idea. I tried it, and it solved everything! Going forward, I'll capitalize the first names from the start.