Daitch–Mokotoff Soundex (D–M Soundex) is a phonetic algorithm invented in 1985 by Jewish genealogists Gary Mokotoff and Randy Daitch. It is a refinement of the Russell and American Soundex algorithms designed to allow greater accuracy in matching of Slavic and Yiddish surnames with similar pronunciation but differences in spelling.
Contents
Daitch–Mokotoff Soundex is sometimes referred to as "Jewish Soundex" and "Eastern European Soundex", although the authors discourage use of these nicknames for the algorithm because the algorithm itself is independent of the fact the motivation for creating the new system was the poor results of predecessor systems when dealing with Slavic and Yiddish surnames.
Improvements
Improvements over the older Soundex algorithms include:
Examples
Some examples:
Beider–Morse Phonetic Name Matching Algorithm
To address the large number of false positive results generated by the D–M Soundex, Stephen P. Morse and Alexander Beider created the Beider–Morse Phonetic Name Matching algorithm. This new algorithm cuts down on false positives at the expense of some false negatives. A number of sites are offering the B–M soundex in addition to the D-M soundex.