[Gpe-list] Bad database design in Contacts

[Graham Cobb]

On Wednesday 30 May 2007 12:05, Florent de Dinechin wrote:
> So I used sqlite to look at the database, and it is uglily
> redondant. Ex:
> 3|FAMILY_NAME|Dinechin
> 3|GIVEN_NAME|Florent
> 3|NAME|Florent de Dinechin
> 3|MIDDLE_NAME|de

I can't comment on why the particular database structure was chosen but I do 
know that the situation is more complex than it may appear.  For example, the 
vCard standard defines two completely separate fields for the textual 
representation of the name (FN) and for the structured breakdown of the name 
(N -- which consists of Family Name, Given Name, Additional Names, Honorific 
Prefixes, and Honorific Suffixes).  

These two representations may be very different and may not be convertible (or 
even related).  Even in the simple example given in RFC 2426 the FN is "Mr. 
John Q. Public, Esq." and the N is "Public;John;Quinlan;Mr.;Esq.".  However, 
using a middle initial is an American convention.  In my case, although I 
have a middle name, I would not normally include it (even as an initial) in 
my FN.

In my view, the only problem with the record above is that "de" has been 
interpreted as a middle name instead of part of the family name.  This 
suggests to me that the problem which needs fixing is probably in the data 
input.  There would be a useful new feature to add which would be a new field 
to use for ordering (which, in your case, would presumably be set 
to "Dinechin" if you want to ignore the "de" when sorting).  This would also 
be useful for cases where you want to sort Mc and Mac together (usually done 
in the UK: McXXX is sorted as though it were spelt MacXXX).

Graham