On Mon, Sep 26 2011, Roland Winkler wrote:
> On Sun Sep 25 2011 Roland Winkler wrote:
>> A much fancier solution would be to reimplement bbdb-create from
>> scratch by using something like a form to fill, similar to what
>> customize is using.
>
> I should add: Such a rather substantial change would have rather low
> priority on my current BBDB agenda. Currently, I consider a proper
> BBDB release more important.
>
>> A simple solution would be that if the user enters a name string
>> that contains a special character such as "%" as separator, then
>> this defines the first and last name. So then you would have to
>> enter the name as "%Lucky Star Buffet Restaurant". Would this be
>> useful?
>
> Such a scheme, while not perfect, could provide a reasonable
> solution till someone finds the time to implement a fancier scheme.
> (This scheme would only require a few lines of new code.)
>
> Yet in any case: suggestions for better schemes are always welcome.
Why not have separate minibuffer prompts for surname and given name?
Many of my records are for Chinese people. Right now I can't be bothered
separating out the characters for surname and given name, and usually
they all get lumped into whatever default bbdb picks for names with no
spaces. Separate prompts for surname and given name would solve this
(and the surname prompt could say "…or organization name", something
like that).
Or, if a syntax for splitting is introduced, perhaps it could indicate
which side is the surname and which the given name, to make it easier to
create records for cultures where surname comes first. I'm not bothered
that the resulting name is displayed "backwards" (given name first), but
it would be great if entry were made easier.
My random suggestion: use "{" or "}" for the separator. The surname is
the part that's "inside" the bracket. So:
Eric{Abrahamsen
王}小波
{Lucky Star Buffet Restaurant
Bartók}Béla
On second thought, if you did it this way, BBDB could "learn" from the
parsing the proper display order of the name, and store that as a
boolean with the name itself. Parsing would be a little more
complicated, but this would provide for much more flexible
customization.
Two cents,
Eric
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