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Which is very cool until you have to interface with systems expecting first/last name :-( When my last company did phone numbers we just let it be free text…

esperent 3y ago
I'm always surprised there's no (widely used) international standard here. It seems like we have international standards for nearly everything. But for some reason we still use the western first-middle-last naming structure as a de-facto standard and as soon as you have to accommodate people from one of the many cultures that don't use this, you're in trouble. I've even run into trouble occasionally as a Western person with fairly normal first and last but no middle name. More than once I've been confronted with online forms that require a middle name (not for many years though, thankfully).
- spookthesunset 3y ago
  We basically had three fields. First and last, but that was because we had to interface with tons of internal and external entities that required it. And we had a freetext “spoken name” that would be used all over the site. Good times. There is an ISO standard for phone numbers, actually. There are even libraries to parse phone numbers into the format. That being said, for “non machine readable” phone numbers (say for a contacts app) some say you should keep it free text because people plug all kinds of shit into the field and if you aren’t using it to send messages/voice/whatever just let the user do whatever…
- HeavyStorm 3y ago
  Please don't call it "western". Most Latin languages, the majority of the western culture, don't have just two names. This is exclusively Anglo-Saxon (or something), not "western"
  - esperent 3y ago
    I stated three names in my comment: first-middle-last. It's also common to put more than one name, or hyphenated names, in any of those fields so this format suits anywhere more than two names, as long as they roughly follow the format first ... nth ... last. I think this covers all western names. If not, please give me examples. The problem arises when the order is reversed (e.g Vietnamese), or when there's only one name and the form requires at least two names. And probably for other name formats saying around the world that I'm not aware of.
    - kiliancs 3y ago
      In Spain, people usually have one or two names, then two last (family) names. No hyphens. In Catalonia, the two family names are sometimes "anded". Example: Miquel Martí i Pol.
      - esperent 3y ago
        That still fits in a form with first-<middle>-last fields. And officials reading the form will know to call the person Miquel. First: Miquel Middle: empty Last: Martí i Pol The problem is for names that don't work in that format.

esperent 3y ago

I'm always surprised there's no (widely used) international standard here. It seems like we have international standards for nearly everything. But for some reason we still use the western first-middle-last naming structure as a de-facto standard and as soon as you have to accommodate people from one of the many cultures that don't use this, you're in trouble. I've even run into trouble occasionally as a Western person with fairly normal first and last but no middle name. More than once I've been confronted with online forms that require a middle name (not for many years though, thankfully).

spookthesunset 3y ago
We basically had three fields. First and last, but that was because we had to interface with tons of internal and external entities that required it. And we had a freetext “spoken name” that would be used all over the site. Good times. There is an ISO standard for phone numbers, actually. There are even libraries to parse phone numbers into the format. That being said, for “non machine readable” phone numbers (say for a contacts app) some say you should keep it free text because people plug all kinds of shit into the field and if you aren’t using it to send messages/voice/whatever just let the user do whatever…
HeavyStorm 3y ago
Please don't call it "western". Most Latin languages, the majority of the western culture, don't have just two names. This is exclusively Anglo-Saxon (or something), not "western"
- esperent 3y ago
  I stated three names in my comment: first-middle-last. It's also common to put more than one name, or hyphenated names, in any of those fields so this format suits anywhere more than two names, as long as they roughly follow the format first ... nth ... last. I think this covers all western names. If not, please give me examples. The problem arises when the order is reversed (e.g Vietnamese), or when there's only one name and the form requires at least two names. And probably for other name formats saying around the world that I'm not aware of.
  - kiliancs 3y ago
    In Spain, people usually have one or two names, then two last (family) names. No hyphens. In Catalonia, the two family names are sometimes "anded". Example: Miquel Martí i Pol.
    - esperent 3y ago
      That still fits in a form with first-<middle>-last fields. And officials reading the form will know to call the person Miquel. First: Miquel Middle: empty Last: Martí i Pol The problem is for names that don't work in that format.