Fuzzy Searching - some note on how this searching works

"Fuzzy searching" (actually Soundex matching) is an INEXACT method for matching words or names that sould be similar to each other. The algorithm extracts some of what it thinks are the more prominent sounds from the string of characters you enter. It does the same with each word in the target list and picks the best matches.

If you are looking for someone's name and you don't remember the exact spelling try using this method. Using a phonetic spelling of the name probably has the best chance of making a match even if it's not close to the actual spelling. The sound is more important the spelling.

Only use alphabetic characters for this method since it only uses sounds not spelling.

The first character is IMPORTANT. If the first character is wrong the match will not be successful. Fortunately, relatively few initial characters are generally interchangable.

For the moment, this search method expects only ONE input string (no spaces) which will be fuzzily matched with the first name and the last name independently. So, you can do a fuzzy search for a name that might occur either as a first or last name, but you cannot enter a fuzzy first name and a fuzzy last name. Maybe it will be expanded later.

Try it! It might surprise you.

Notes on other searching methods