If the Esploro researcher has full first and middle names, will incoming assets match on first initials?
- Product: Esploro
Description
If we include full first and middle names in the researchers.xml file, will incoming assets match on first initials?
Resolution
You can add "researcher_name_variants" to the researchers.xml for initials (see Researchers Data Format).
In cases where the researcher record in Esploro has (e.g.):
First name: Alan
Middle name: Benson
Last name: Smith
And the record coming from CDI is Alan B. Smith, or A. B. Smith.
The author matching algorithm should recognize them as a match.
In the example, if the algorithm recognizes the middle name “Benson” in the researcher record with the middle name initial “B” in the CDI record as it should, then you wouldn’t need to add “Alan B. Smith”, and “A. B. Smith” as name variants.
The algorithm was designed to be able to deal with this scenario – full middle in researcher and initial in asset.
Best practice: use the same form in which the researchers tend to publish – so if they use the initial – that would be the main name.