Advent of Code is back! Unwrap daily challenges to sharpen your Alteryx skills and earn badges along the way! Learn more now.
Community is experiencing an influx of spam. As we work toward a solution, please use the 'Notify Moderator' option on the ellipsis menu to flag inappropriate posts.

Alteryx Designer Desktop Discussions

Find answers, ask questions, and share expertise about Alteryx Designer Desktop and Intelligence Suite.

Normalizing Column Data when there are multiple spellings, formats of same itm

KJMCLEOD
5 - Atom

I have a file where the same name, location, etc. is spelled multiple ways.  For example if I had a name column and the strings are as such

 

B Jones

B. Jones

BradJones

bradjones

brad jon

 

I hope you can get the idea.  How should I go about making all these strings into the same thing "Brad Jones" So that later those rows can be summarized? I am sure this happens often and can't understand how I can't find and answer already online. 

 

Is there a shorter way of doing it than just using multiple Regex, or if/else statements, or Find replace?  I have over 300 entries, I do not have a reference table to do matching.  I also have the issue that sometimes new spellings or formatting can be added with new data.

 

Any Recommendations. 

1 REPLY 1
PHinkel
7 - Meteor

I would recommend the combination of the Fuzzy Match Tool and then the Make Group Tool to "create" the lookup table for mapping / joining.

PHinkel_0-1680723629588.pngPHinkel_1-1680723650028.png

In "Fuzzy Match Open Example" there is a fantastic example as pictured down below:

PHinkel_0-1680724185152.png

 

Labels