Full Name Given at Birth

Use the full name given at birth, including the complete middle name if there is one. This is usually the name as it exactly appears on the birth certificate. If the name on the birth certificate was never used or was changed shortly after birth, for whatever reason, the name on the birth certificate is still the correct name to use.

The only exceptions: (1) if a clerical error has occurred, use the actual name given at birth, or (2) if you were adopted, use the full adopted name given by the first family you permanently resided with (your soul’s linkage is with your permanent adoptive parents rather than with any foster or natural parents).

Full Name Commonly Used Today

The full name most commonly used today must also be entered. If several different names are used, enter the full name most strongly identified with. That’s usually the name used with family and close friends. Sometimes, if you have a strong career identification, it’s the name used in your professional work. Only use the middle name (or initial) if you more strongly identify with it than without it.

Hyphenated Names

If a name is hyphenated, enter the name with the hyphen.

Compound Names

If the last name is made of compounds, combine them into one name, placing an underscore character between each compound part. For example:

‘Arthur van der Kalen’ is entered as ‘Arthur van_der_kalen’

If a compound name contains either a Y or W, then the following are all valid ways to enter the name. This assures that the Y and W are correctly detected as vowels or consonants:

‘George DeWitt’ can be entered as:

‘George DeWitt’ or as,

‘George De_Witt’ or as,

‘GEORGE DE_WITT’ or as,

‘george de_witt’

but not as ‘George Dewitt’ or ‘GEORGE DEWITT’.

Names Ending With Jr., Sr., II, Etc.

If the name contains a Jr. or Sr. or II, III, etc., following the name, then omit it. For example:

‘Henry Ford, Jr.’ is entered as ‘Henry Ford’

Foreign Alphabets

Foreign alphabets that use the English character set are also supported. Examples include French, Italian and Spanish. If your alphabet uses accents above certain characters, enter the equivalent non-accented character.

If you use the Spanish alphabet containing two character letters (CH, LL and RR), then enter these characters as two single characters surrounded by a left and right parenthesis, i.e., enter CH as a C character followed by a H character (CH). The parentheses will not be displayed, but the double letters will now be correctly treated as a single letter.

For alphabets that do not use the Roman letters—Russian, Japanese, Hebrew, traditional Chinese or Greek for example—use the transliterated name, i.e., the name as written in the Roman alphabet.

Long Names (more then 4 names long)

Finally, our system uses a maximum of four names. If a person’s complete name contains more than four names, only the first and last name are used. If you enter more than four names, all the names will be displayed, but only the first and last names will be used for the calculations. If you want to override this method of calculation, then use the underscore character instead of a space character to separate the extra middle names, so effectively there are only four names. For example:

‘William Steven David Matthew Crown’ can be entered as:

‘William Steven_David Matthew Crown’