[Metadatalibrarians] separating first and last names

[Ross Singer]

Well, also, the various ways that names are defined across the world
makes this more than a matter of first middle last.

One text box and some AACR2 rules, in this regard, right or wrong, is
a lot easier for all parties:  data enterer, database designer,
standards committee, etc.

-Ross.

On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 1:08 PM, Kevin S. Clarke <ksclarke at gmail.com> wrote:
> This is a question that interests me as well.  MODS does have separate
> elements for first and last name but things like Dublin Core don't.
> Personally I would agree with you that splitting them is better.  I
> think the ones that don't just don't for simplicity's sake... it's
> easier to process in a very simple way if you just take the one thing
> as is.  It does limit your flexibility though in indexing and display.
>
> Is your schema something that can be shared?  I'd be interested in seeing it.
>
> Kevin
>
>
>
> On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 12:31 PM, Stacy Wile <stacywile at yahoo.com> wrote:
>> I have developed a metadata schema for my company, which publishes reprints of articles and book chapters for instructors. The metadata describes each of these selections. I created separate fields for the first and last names of the authors, but in surveying existing metadata standards, it seems that they all define a single field for personal names. I created separate fields to facilitate searching and sorting, so that the software would not have to extract the last name in real time. Can anyone tell me why single fields are so much more common?
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