DSXchange

I have created a custom name ruleset that is based on the USNAME .PAT The only thing I wanted to do was to capture some international names in the custom ruleset.

Here's the problem.. I have multiple names such as
John M
John M
John M

I am wondering if QS will have a problem with multiple names. (Just in case I sorted the names and they are all in alpha order).

Also, I am wondering if the gender code should be in a specific location on the FIRSTNM.TBL? I have many cases like

ALEX M
ALEXANDER M

Would this create a problem?

I just don't want to go through 9000+ names and eliminate the duplicates by hand

Thanks...

1. You can't have dupes in the first column of a table, think of like this: col 1 is the input, and col 2 the output or standard version. You can't have two inputs delivering different outputs, so you can't have two identical inputs!

2. Use Ultraedit or something similar to sort and dedupe your data, or even use an investigation stage of QS, that's what it's there for and is very good!

3. Gender code is the second column, delimited by one or more spaces from the second... look at the tables and the code carefully. There's a clever twist that allows the ruleset to interpret BILL as WILLIAM by putting BILL MWILLIAM in the table and specifically referencing the first and remaining characters of the second column.