#993 Surname cluster

[Victor H.]

I would like a surname clustering or surname family function in PGV. There are a number of surname variants in my lines (Hawk, Hawke, Haulk; Hanson, Henson, Hinson; Jones, Johns; and so on) for instance, and currently when I do a name search or Indi list I have to remember all the variants. The existing PGV alternate-name functionality essentially is at the level of individual alias. I would like a larger, more global function, such that when I search for "john hawk" it also brings up "john haulk", and when I do an Indi list of surname "hanson" it returns hinson and henson as well.

This request is an offshoot of Greg's discussion on the NAME_REVERSE function, where he made the comment that <<Closer to home, we have a "Froggitt" branch of the family. The odd member spells their name as "Froggatt", "Froggett" or "Froggott". By putting Froggitt into the SURN field, regardless of the spelling in the NAME field, we can have them all listed together on the INDI list>>. But again I'm requesting a more global function where surnames A, B, and C are always held to be equivalents when doing a search or list.

[Greg Roach]

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Latest SVN can do this.

If you put the "prefered" surname in the SURN field, all the variants will be grouped/sorted together. e.g.

1 NAME John /Hauwke/
2 GIVN JOHN
2 SURN Hawk

(or even "2 SURN Hawk,Hauwke")

[Victor H.]

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My request is for a global function that will equate surname A to surname A' for the purposes of searching and listing. If I understand you right then the SVN will provide a workaround based on one individual at a time, which will work fine for cases where surname A' is a tiny fraction of the population, but becomes unwieldy if A' is a large number. Consider a hypothetical user who has 4000 Hanson and 3000 Henson in his database; he would not want to go into all his Henson records and update each one individually, and similarly, if new research later showed that Henson was the dominant name and Hanson the anomaly, he would not want to then go and change all these INDI records individually. But for my immediate purposes, the workaround should serve me well.

[Greg Roach]

<<But for my immediate purposes, the workaround should serve me well.>>

Can we close this then?

[Victor H.]

I would like for it to remain open, because the workaround (updating all the individual records) does not meet the spirit of my request, which is that of a global grouping. Conceptually I'm looking for an extra PGV table that, when any user searches for, say, John Hanson, PGV will check the surname cluster table for variants to Hanson, such as Henson, Hinson, Hansom, etc. - whatever the user has populated and return results for John Hanson, John Hinson, John Henson, and so on. A global table that can be maintained independently of the INDI records.

Thanks,
Victor