Omnidex Text

Phonetic Searches

Phonetic Searches search for rows based on words that phonetically similar to the keyword criteria. The keyword is reduces to a phonetic code, which is then matched to other words that share that phonetic code. This expanded list of keywords with matching phonetic codes is then used as search criteria.

Omnidex uses three different algorithms for phonetic searches: Soundex, Metaphone and Double-Metaphone. Metaphone is a generally regarded as a more advanced algorithm than Soundex, and Double-Metaphone is regarded as an improvement on Metaphone. Metaphone is similar to Soundex in that it reduces a word to a phonetic code, and that phonetic code is then shared by all words that sound phonetically similar. Double-Metaphone differs from Metaphone in that it may produce two phonetic codes for one word for those cases where a word has two common pronunciations

All three phonetic algorithms are best suited for given names and surnames, rather than general words. The rules of phonetic equivalence are quite complex, and these algorithms were all designed specifically for processing given names and surnames. Nevertheless, these algorithms may be used on all textual data, and will usually produce satisfactory results.

The Phonetic option, ;SX, will cause the data to be indexed using both the word and its Double-Metaphone equivalents. Use the ;SX2 option for Metaphone equivalents and the ;SX3 option for Soundex-style equivalents.

Phonetic searches are accomplished by using the PHONETIC option of the $CONTAINS function, or by using the PHONETIC function directly in the qualification criteria. Phonetic equivalents are directly accessible using the $SOUNDEX, $METAPHONE and $DOUBLE_METAPHONE functions in SQL.

Phonetic searches should only be done at the outer most level of nesting.

PHONETIC Function

Syntax

PHONETIC(criteria[, approach[, options]])

criteria
Required. The qualification criteria to be converted to their phonetic equivalent.

approach
Optional. At this time, approach is determined by the Omnidex installation option, ;SX, ;SX2, or ;SX3. Therefore, this option is currently ignored.

options
Optional. See Options (below) for a list of valid options.

Options

There are currently no valid options available for use with this function.

Example

The following two statements will produce the same results.

QUALIFY CATALOG WHERE CONTENT = 'PHONETIC(Smith)'

SELECT * FROM CATALOG WHERE $CONTAINS(CONTENT,'Smith','phonetic')

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