Variable name string into components

[Aussie John]

I often receive names strings which vary in format, eg

Harris, John Dr

Harris, Dr John

Dr John Harris

John Harris

 

I would like to extract the component names.

 

My plan -  which is my question - is to find the word number of the title (eg Dr=3), Once I have the word number for the title I can use various middlewords to extract  the name components. BTW titles are likely to including a variety of options. Dr, A/Prof, Prof, Ms, Mrs, Mr

 

 

For info, I have a clunky workaround for components which might be read as more than one word eg A/Prof, Smith-Harris by using substitute - "/"  "slash", "-" to "hyphen, etc extract via middlewords and then substitute back.

 

All suggestions welcome.

 

[Lee Smith]

Why the big difference in the entry? Is the collection of this data in your control?

 

I posted a file  Links to files here that you might find helpful, but really your example of the data is convoluted.

 

HTH

 

Lee

[Aussie John]

Indeed it is convoluted but the sources of information are different and definitely out of my control. Actually it is worse than I indicated as sometimes a nickname might be shown in brackets as well or use a shortened version of a name. I am trying to bring together multiple lists which have different additional information

Edited November 16, 2012 by Lee Smith
Removed quote, it was distorting you question

[Lee Smith]

Hey John,

 

Wow, Good Luck with this project. It sounds like you can use Lynn's file by using scripts, but it certainly appears that it will be a hand's on project.

 

I'm curious though, is there any consistency within the individual list, or does each file have all of the same problems? 

 

Lee

[Aussie John]

Thanks Lee. Each source tends to be similar. Sometimes drops the title.