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Comment by arghwhat | Hacker News Reader

> Suppose you have a unicode blob of my name in your database and there is a problem and you need to call me and say hi. Would your customer representative be able to pronounce my name somewhat correctly?

You cannot pronounce the name regardless of whether it is written in ASCII. Pronouncing a name requires at the very least knowledge of the language it originated in, and attempts at reading it with an English pronunciation can range from incomprehensible to outright offensive.

The only way to correctly deal with a name that you are unfamiliar with the pronunciation of is to ask how it is pronounced.

You must store and operate on the person's name as is. Requiring a name modified, or modifying it automatically, is unacceptable - in many cases legal names must be represented accurately as your records might be used for e.g. tax or legal reasons later.

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>You must store and operate on the person's name as is. Requiring a name modified, or modifying it automatically, is unacceptable

But this is simply not true in practice and at times it's just plain wrong in theory too. The in practice part is trivially discoverable in the real world.

As to in theory -- I do in fact want a properly functioning service to use my name in a vocative case (which requires modifying it automatically or having a dictionary of names) in their communications that are sent in my native language. Not doing that is plainly grammatically wrong and borderline impolite. In fact I use services that do it just right. I also don't want to know to specify the correct version myself, as it's trivially derivable through established rules of the languages.

Sure, there are sites that mistreat names in ways you describe, but that does not make it correct.

> I do in fact want a properly functioning service to use my name in a vocative case. ... I also don't want to know to specify the correct version myself, as it's trivially derivable through established rules of the languages.

There would be nothing to discuss if this was trivial.

> Not doing that is plainly grammatically wrong and borderline impolite.

Do you know what's more than borderline impolite? Getting someone's name wrong, or even claiming that their legal name is invalid and thereby making it impossible for them to sign up.

If getting a name right and using a grammatical form are mutually exclusive, there is no argument to be had about which to prioritize.

> You cannot pronounce the name regardless of whether it is written in ASCII. Pronouncing a name requires at the very least knowledge of the language it originated in, and attempts at reading it with an English pronunciation can range from incomprehensible to outright offensive.

Offensive if you WANT to be offended perhaps but definitely understandable, which is the main thing that matters.

Sorry to nitpick, but you underestimated: "many cases" is really "all cases", no exception, because under GDPR you have right to correct your data (this is about legal name, so obviously covered). So if user requests under GDPR art. 16 that his/her name is to be represented in a way that matches ID card or whatever legal document, then you either do it, or you pay a fine and then you do it.

That a particular technical solution is incapable of storing it in the preferred way is not an excuse. EBCDIC is incompatible with GDPR: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28986735

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