Use Coda AI to simplify corrections
correct calling and full names with AI
I use a form to capture name related data:
- Calling name like Louise-Marie
- Family name like d’Orléans
- Full names. When your calling name is Christiaan, your full name can be Christiaan Ary
I used Wikipedia to share some back ground of names with or without a hyphen since our specific interest is in so called double-barrelled names. Examples of some notable people with double-barrelled names include Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and Sacha Baron Cohen.
In British tradition, a double surname is heritable, usually taken to preserve a family name that would have become extinct due to the absence of male descendants bearing the name, connected to the inheritance of a family estate. Examples include Harding-Rolls and Stopford Sackville.
An other example. In the Hispanic tradition, double surnames are the norm, and not an indication of social status. Hyphenated last names usually correspond to both last names of one of the parents but both last names can be hyphenated, so some Hispanics may legally have two double-barrelled last names corresponding to both last names of both parents. Many Spanish scholars use a pen name where they enter a hyphen between their last names to avoid being misrepresented in citations.
Users make mistakes
It happens people write their names without capitals. We need the names properly spelled. When one writes Winnie madikizela-Mandela or Winnie Madikizela-mandela we need to intervene.
Solving the puzzle
It gets complicated when people have names like Louise-Marie d’Orléans. When you only have a calling name without a hyphen you know the position of the letter (always the first letter) and since a name is a text, you can apply Splice(). When you have max one hyphen in the name, you can use Find() and work with that in your Splice().
The alternative is RegexReplace() which requires an additional skill set.
I wrote a few complex rules to check some use cases, but soon I realized that we may have an easier way to solve this puzzle.
Apply AI to simplify
So far AI testing with calculations and the Coda formula language has been a disappointing experience. It is something else with text. The Coda AI does an okay job with summaries, suggestions and so forth.
I asked the AI to help me correcting the names by making sure they start with a capital. Below the instructions.
It works rather okay.
I believe there is no need to write any complex formula that deal with multiple names with or without hyphen. The AI understand mostly what needs to be done and executes accordingly.
In case AI may fail us and we need to see that. I wrote a rule that highlights the AI corrections, this enables the user to check rapidly if the change is indeed an improvement. By pressing on the refresh you likely get the improved result.
For the moment we cannot rely on AI as we wish, but over time this will change and AI will become more reliable.
Not for family names
We correct calling names and full names, but not family names. The reason is that not all parts of a family name start with a capital. When your family name is ‘van Buren’ you don’t want to see ‘Van Buren’, because that is a different family name.
Long story short, the AI solves a problem good enough we could have solved programmatically at great time expense. It is easier with AI. In this context, the AI lowers the floor with quite a few steps.
My name is Christiaan and I support SMB with calculations (budgets and — Human Resource — planning) and I prefer using Coda to get the job done. More about me below:
I hope you enjoyed this article. If you have questions feel free to reach out. Though this article is for free, my work (including advice) won’t be, but there is always room for a chat to see what can be done. You find my (for free) contributions to the Coda Community and on Twitter.
Coda comes with a set of building blocks ー like pages for infinite depth, tables that talk to each other, and buttons that take action inside or outside your doc ーso anyone can make a doc as powerful as an app (source).
Not to forget: the Coda Community provides great insights for free once you add a sample doc.
