
Your name is way too long for your ID - bpierre
http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/09/12/janice-lokelani-keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NP_Top_Stories+%28National+Post+-+Top+Stories%29
======
cstross
See also "Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Names":
[http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-
programmers-b...](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-
believe-about-names/) (This falls under point #6)

~~~
grannyg00se
But should we really worry about the 0.01% outlier who has seven different
names, each consisting of some kind of personal scribble that changes
depending on the phase of the moon?

More on topic, why should official systems allow for names of arbitrary
length? Obviously your 1800 character preference for last name is not going to
fit on all standard forms of identification. A standards-compliant name should
be issued and you can use your preferred name for personal matters.

~~~
TillE
> the 0.01% outlier who has seven different names, each consisting of some
> kind of personal scribble that changes depending on the phase of the moon?

I cannot adequately express my dislike for this kind of mockery. Seriously,
fucking stop it.

~~~
cstross
Agreed.

The real issue is that too many programmers apply their own cultural norms to
the issue of naming, in ways which privilege their particular culture at the
expense of others'.

(You want to be able to identify people uniquely? Fine: allocate them a
globally unique ID string within your own system. Then let them link this to
whatever the hell they want -- be it an Anglophone forename-middlename-surname
string sequence, or something _entirely different_ that fits their cultural
requirements. Once you get into designing a procrustean name storage
architecture and insisting that everyone uses their true name, then you are
inflicting your own culture's naming requirements on them, which is offensive
at best. Especially when it _isn 't necessary_.)

~~~
grannyg00se
Sure. You go ahead and create a "culturally sensitive" system that allows
people to create randomly changing names based on multiple character sets and
unlimited length. On an infrastructure that was put in place in 1980 with a
minimal budget just to get something running quickly because it was supposed
to be temporary.

Most systems aren't going to be built with infinite flexibility. Some might
argue that wouldn't even be possible. And perhaps it has absolutely nothing to
do with the programmer's own cultural norms, but the system they are
programming on, the budget they are dealing with, and their level of
competency. Not every action that is offensive to a particular group is done
deliberately to offend that group or even with the knowledge that it could be
offensive.

~~~
pessimizer
>Not every action that is offensive to a particular group is done deliberately
to offend that group

Irrelevant.

>or even with the knowledge that it could be offensive.

Irrelevant to your argument, which is that we should continue doing it even
after we figure out that it's offensive, because fuck them.

~~~
res0nat0r
Meh. The .01% comment is perfectly relevant. Should the system be re-organized
from the ground up and new licenses issued to everyone in the USA to
accomodate last names of her length? I can't wait to carry around my postcard
size license in my back pocket.

The system was written to work for the 99.9% of users it serves, the other
0.01% will unfortunately have to deal with the problem of being outliers.

------
pixelcort
I am a U.S. citizen who recently moved to Japan. When I entered the country,
my first and middle names were combined to create a 20 character given name
that appears on my Japan-issued ID.

Ignoring the more common issues of computer systems not accepting non-Japanese
names, it has been a bureaucratic nightmare, struggling with applying for
credit cards, opening banking and investment accounts, and linking things
together, as each system has different lengths limits for names, and in some
systems my name is input as Unicode "double width romaji", which in some
systems will not match the otherwise identical ASCII version of the name.

I truly wish I was offered the ability during immigration to just drop the
middle name, but even then my first name is longer than some systems' 5
character limit, where I am often put in as "Cortl".

~~~
Pxtl
> "double width romaji"

The double-width latin characters are the bane of every data analysis using
Asian data. It's a roll of the dice whether any given Latin character will be
in typical ASCII form or double-width form.

I'm sure there's some "seriously insensitive character comparison" library out
there, but it's not built into my SQL server's "LIKE" operator, that's for
sure.

~~~
rspeer
The seriously insensitive character comparison you're looking for is NFKC
normalization (see
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode_equivalence](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode_equivalence)).

You would probably be able to normalize all your strings before putting them
into your database. You'd lose no functionality unless at some point later you
really did need to distinguish "C" from "﻿Ｃ".

------
polymatter
I had a similar problem. I have a Brazilian name which means I have multiple
middle names which normally means it can't fit in the required space.

When I renewed my UK Passport they just decided to lose one of my names. I was
furious, but it became clear I'd need to go through administrative hell to
correct it, and I needed the passport at the time.

Some time later, I've just given up on having my full name. I prefer just to
give out a firstname lastname and ignore my middlenames. Its just far too much
hassle to go through. As far as I am concerned, I have an external name which
fits in ASCII and complies with anglo-centric formulae and an internal name
which doesn't.

Thats just my personal choice though. My sister is defiant and managed to get
her full name on by demanding that it was an unhyphenated triple barreled
surname.

~~~
vidarh
Is what your sister claimed sort-of correct anyway? An English middle name is
generally a given name that can perfectly well be totally unrelated to family
history.

It's my understanding that Brazilian (and Portuguese) "middle names" are
usually if not always family names, are they not?

Insisting that they are part of your surname sounds like it might be the
easiest way to get it accepted - it is common enough in Europe to have
surnames with spaces. E.g. a Dutch surname like "Van der Vaart", or "Van
Helsing", so it's quite likely various agencies etc. run into that often
enough.

~~~
jotaass
It's quite usual to have two family names, one from your mother's side and
another from your father's. Usually the father's family name comes last, but
it's by no means a rule, more of a social norm (and somewhat fading).

Additionally, it's also perfectly reasonable to have two or more "first
names".

The consequence of all of this, and having four names myself, is that I'm
always confused what I'm supposed to fill in as my first and last names. I end
up using just my very first and very last, but i always feel like I'm being
disrespectful towards my mother's family for the omission.

~~~
cgore
Something similar used to be common with the english too. My great-great-
great-great grandfather was "Thomas Tindall Gore", and Tindall was his
mother's maiden name. This sort of thing was quite common all throughout the
1700's and 1800's, but seems to have went out of style in the last hundred
years or so.

~~~
akavi
I actually assumed, well into my teenage years, that people's middle names
were their mother's maiden name, as that's the case for me, my sister, and my
cousins.

~~~
cgore
Another interesting one I would see a lot is <mother's father's name>
<father's father's name> <last name>.

For example, My dad was Charles Marvin Gore. His mother's father was Charles
Maltbie. His father's father was Marvin Gore.

I don't think I ever saw the two modes combined though, so no example of a
Charles Marvin Maltbie Gore. Although that is just in my family. It might have
happened in others.

------
tilsammans
Let's for a minute assume that we as developers will be able to agree on some
sort of best practice. The "Falsehoods" article and the W3C page mentioned in
the comments are good, valuable resources and I really hope developers across
the world will take them into consideration.

Then it is time to show your form to the client and he/she goes nuts!

"People must enter their full name". Okay they can just write their full name
into this text input. "No they must enter both first and last name". But not
everyone in the world has a first and last name. Icelandic people? "Just
require a space in the name". Like nobody in China has? "Don't argue with me,
I am the client, require a space!!!ONE!"

It's discussions like these I feel I can't really win. Most clients aren't
technical, they are chock full of assumptions and they are not paying me to
argue with them, they are paying me to require first name and last name and
quick!

I understand that education needs to happen but there are limits as to how
much education your client accepts from you before he goes to a different
shop.

~~~
viraptor
Iceland has both first and last names, afaik. It's just the inheritance (first
name + suffix becomes child's last name) and sorting that changes (usually by
first rather than last name).

~~~
Dylan16807
China has first names and last names too. I don't see why that client is a
problem. Especially since I'd have no idea how to isolate the family name
without having multiple fields or a space. It seems like either half could be
1-2 characters, so what do you do with a three character full name?

------
matthuggins
I love the level of ignorance in the comments on that article. e.g.:

> I doubt she can even pronounce it.

or:

> I am surprised her first name is Janice? She should change it to
> IamsofullofmyselfbecauseIamsospecialbecauseImarriedahawainman.

...and the list goes on. Just because your heritage has shorter names or names
that don't sound anything like hers doesn't mean your culture is "right" or
something. People need to learn to be more open-minded.

------
bpierre
There is an interesting article on w3.org about names and websites
assumptions: [http://www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-personal-
names](http://www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-personal-names)

~~~
chiph
I've tried to promote one of their suggestions -- having just one big name
field, plus another for "How do acquaintances address you?" to let the user
enter what they want to be called in an email greeting. So far, not one
employer has gone for it. Just too radical an idea -- to let the user self-
identify.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Don't have just one. I'd suggest two:

* What is your full name, including title? (e.g. Mr John Jules Smith, Señor José Hernández Fernádéz, Kim Ban-Moon)

* How do you wish to be referred to? (e.g. Mr Smith, John, Sñr Hernández, Mr Kim)

* How should we address you? (e.g. Mr Smith or John)

~~~
chiph
The one I've considered adding is: "How would people would expect to find you
in the phone directory?"

Which covers the Icelandic given-name first scenario, as well as the
matronymic vs patronymic issue. This puts the person in control of _what_ to
sort on, while _how_ to sort it would be controlled by the active user's
culture settings.

~~~
patmcc
This has the problem of any user under 20 asking "What's a phone directory?"

------
xradionut
I've work with names and other demographic data darn near my entire career.
I've also had name issues due to the length of one of my names.

Things are better and more accommodating than twenty years ago when every byte
was precious. But some cultures and individuals get ridiculous. I'm not
allocating 400 characters of space in a standard name field just because you
want to include your family tree, PGP key, DNA sequence and homeland geology
in your name. (I will put this in another table, and link it relationally so
the software and the people can access your true name.)

~~~
king_jester
> But some cultures and individuals get ridiculous. I'm not allocating 400
> characters of space in a standard name field just because you want to
> include your family tree, PGP key, DNA sequence and homeland geology in your
> name. (I will put this in another table, and link it relationally so the
> software and the people can access your true name.)

This attitude boils down to "I write software that is easy for me to write,
not easy for you to use." Why should any user want to use the software a
developer that is hostile to their existence?

~~~
claudius
The key is obviously to make some trade-off between usability and difficulty
during creation. If the software is never finished because running test cases
with 10e10 chars-long names takes too long, users won’t even be given the
choice of not using it.

That said, I’d love to have my PGP fingerprint on my ID :)

------
randyrand
As much as I want to agree, there needs to be _some_ standardization. Whether
its the supported character set or the name lengths, it's literally impossible
to support everything. Personally I think every state should have a list of
legal constraints for a name - maybe they already do.

~~~
snitko
For god's sake. It's just a piece of paper. If a name is too long for it,
well, damn, spend some additional time and customize it and print this one
special id.

~~~
emhart
This. Whether for this specific case or in general, the rigidity of these sort
of governmental/administrative systems dehumanize us. We are engaged in a
conversation about the standardization of names, about applying limits to our
given, or chosen names because of? What? Suppressing cultural or personal
identities...why? So everyone can parse your name on an ID?

For a community that routinely cries out against national ID laws and
champions the right to anonymity, many of the comments on this thread surprise
me.

------
DanBC
The article links to another article about names in New Zealand, which need
government approval.

([http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/01/world/asia/new-zealand-
sta...](http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/01/world/asia/new-zealand-stange-baby-
names/index.html))

I thought that some people were just sending comedy names because, well,
that's what some people do.

But some parents aren't joking around:

> Four years ago, a 9-year-old girl was taken away from her parents by the
> state so that her name could be changed from "Talula Does the Hula From
> Hawaii."

([http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2008/jul/24/familyan...](http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2008/jul/24/familyandrelationships.newzealand))

> _A family court judge, Rob Murfitt, gave the order after hearing that the
> child was embarrassed about her name and had refused to reveal it to
> friends. "She told people her name was K because she feared being mocked and
> teased," the child's lawyer, Colleen MacLeod, told the court._

> _The judge criticised parents who give their offspring bizarre names, saying
> it exposed children to ridicule among their peers._

> _" The court is profoundly concerned about the very poor judgment that this
> child's parents have shown in choosing this name. It makes a fool of the
> child and sets her up with a social disability and handicap, unnecessarily,"
> he said._

------
kbart
_scribbles a note to himself_ "who the f__k would need a name field in UI
longer than 32 symbols" is not a valid argument.

------
mavhc
And that's why everyone should be referred to by their assigned 128 bit GUID

------
michalu
"disrespectful to all Hawaiian people" some people will say and make
themselves believe anything to get their 15 minutes of fame.

I am foreigner living in UK and local council and government constantly screw
up foreigners names, we always have a good laugh about it with friends.

~~~
btilly
Did you note that she lives in Hawaii? Screwing up foreigner's names is one
thing. Screwing up the locals is another.

The locals in this case still resent the way that the USA took over in a coup.
See
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Kingdom_of_Haw...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Kingdom_of_Hawaii)
for the history.

~~~
EvanKelly
There's actually more to the story.

She's not actually Hawaiian, but she married a native Hawaiian and took his
name. He passed away and she wants to keep the name to remember him by.

In Hawaii right now there seem to be two prevailing schools of thought.

1) It's the state's responsibility to respect everyone's name.

2) She shouldn't have to change her name, but they don't have to put the whole
thing on her ID

------
Smirnoff
You don't have to go too far. Twitter doesn't let me put my full name either.

I have a typical Russian name (Vladislav) and a last name that consists of 11
letters. Is that really too long for Twitter to handle?

~~~
batuhanicoz
My full name is "Fırat Batuhan İçöz", it is 17 characters (including the space
between my first and middle name). And Twitter didn't have a problem with it,
when I used my full name in the past.

And just tried adding my first name again, it works.

------
ck2
Am I the only one who wants to know how it is pronounced and what the meaning
possibly is?

I'm with her on this one but I am curious how a government would handle an
ancestral name that has glyphs.

~~~
joshz
How it's pronounced: [http://www.khon2.com/2013/09/10/action-line-state-
alters-wom...](http://www.khon2.com/2013/09/10/action-line-state-alters-
womans-name-after-it-fails-to-fit-on-drivers-license/)

------
cocoflunchy
Similar story here... My first and middle name were concatenated on my social
security card, and I lost a few letters in the process too.

------
jjindev
On most days start-up programmers think about carving out a solution for a
large enough serviceable, available, market. Time to market matters. Mark it
as an open issue and move on. Etc. On other days, programmers are advised that
it is culturally insensitive to leave anyone behind. People are mock-scolded
that if they don't allocate their efforts to the 0.01% subset of their name
system, they are bad people, whatever start-up dream they had.

BTW, my family used the Scandinavian "-sen" system of naming, until the
government told everyone they had to stop, that heritable names made tracking
easier. I'm one of the thousands/millions of people worldwide locked in as
"son of Jens."

------
isaacjohnwesley
She should live in India, all her identification cards will have shortened
names automatically because the data entry operator names the citizen here and
not parents. I have so much trouble with Isaac and Issac :(

------
mrweasel
That reminds me that SAP has yet to respond to my question "Is SAP Business
One not sold in Sweden". For some reason it has been decided that 50
characters are enough for a field that contains first middle- and last- name.
Normally you can just deal with the extremely long name when and if they
occur, but 50 characters is pushing it a bit.

------
rocky1138
I've had arguments with people in the past about this sort of thing: names are
overrated and not a unique identifier. If the UID on the identification card
matches the info in the system, the card ID is valid and up-to-date, the face
matches, and the name is close, it's a match.

------
notallama
solution 1: spill over to second card.

solution 2: hash function

------
orng
Similarly: here in Iceland your official full name cannot exceed 32
characters, including spaces, due to legacy database constraints. It's
retarded and has been highly debated recently.

------
pacofvf
until recently I couldn't use my last name in Facebook, and its pattern it's
very common in Spanish: "de la Fuente"

------
madaxe
On a tangent - NP _really_ need to obfuscate those ID's better. Pixellating is
pretty readily reversible - you just need the base card image (find it or shop
it), and you can then brute-force by iterating through numbers/letters as
needed for each field, pixellating, and comparing the outputs.

Edit: in fact, as they've included two images with the same info, pixellated
differently, you could almost certainly heuristically solve without brute-
forcing. Eigenvectors, baby.

~~~
kordless
You reminded me of this:
[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/06/xerox_copier_flaw_me...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/06/xerox_copier_flaw_means_dodgy_numbers_and_dangerous_designs/)

I wonder if you did reverse out her name if it would have all the right
characters in it, and if it didn't, what sort of changes to would make her
family heritage in the process? :)

------
notjustanymike
Note to self: never hire a Hawaiian to write code!

I can just picture it now: function
convertThisDecimalDeclaredByMyCoworkerTimToBackWhenWeStartedThisCompanyThreeYearsAgoAnInteger()
{}

~~~
didgeoridoo
Oh so like Objective-C?

