Originally Posted by macropod

It's a whole lot more complicated than that. What happens if your database has Dr Robert Jones, Dr Martha Jones, Dr Fred Johns, Dr John Johnson, Dr Ian Johnston and Dr Ann Johnstone? How is typing "Jo" going to get you the required output? Even typing "Jones" or "Johns" won't give you a single match and presumably you don't want your code to choose one at random. The best you'll do in many cases is to obtain a list of possibilities from which you must choose. I ought to know - I worked with electoral rolls for 25 years...