[FX.php List] [OFF] levenshtein and related methods for user helper

[Troy Meyers]

David,

I've considered some sort of AJAX-type interface, perhaps like type-ahead, that could aid in spelling. I think the user must always be able to enter things that wouldn't be known by a type-ahead method, though, because often the donor is just referring to a plant tag that arrived with the plant years ago, frequently misspelled or partly obliterated.

I haven't tried to go up the AJAX learning-slope yet, though.

Maybe you are suggesting something like this? The Missouri Botanical Garden has an interface like this that I envy. Take a look at:
http://www.tropicos.org/
Start typing, in the Quick Name Search: box, something like this:
Cischweinfia popowiana
...and you can see how it helps. I'd like that. They have a huge list of recognized botanical name, obviously, and have some nice code for accessing it. Just to clarify the amount of data involved, they cover more or less ALL plant species. Here, we only do orchids, and there are about 80,000 of them (depending on if you are a lumper or splitter) and generally numerous synonyms for each.

Is this like what you were suggesting?

Actually, one more comment about that, I don't want to make it TOO easy for a donor to select a previous registration. I want them to put some thought into it when they decide if it's previously registered or not. If a previously registered plant is sort of chosen for them by the interface, then it'd be likely that hurried or lazy donors might go with the choice even if it's actually a different plant of the same species, something we certainly do NOT want them to do.

-Troy


> Hi Troy,
> 
> I haven't thought this through completely, but it might be faster to  
> develop and maybe have more use depending on how you use the Filemaker  
> interface, to build dynamic match lists in filemaker that then are  
> carried over to php. For instance, it's not that hard to build a  
> similar items kind of list based on known criteria in filemaker that  
> could be part of your entry screen so you would build in a kind of  
> navigation tool that does some proactive error checking on data entry.
> 
> - david