Updated almost 10 years ago by Jon Goldberg

Prefix/Suffix Mapping¶

Here, we're referring to name prefixes like "Mr.", "Ms.", "Dr.", "Senator", and suffixes like "Esq.", "Sr.", "MD", and so on.

When editing an individual's prefix/suffix, CiviCRM requires you to pick from a list. It's easy to edit, but is intended to avoid the common situation of seeing "Mr", "Mr.", "MR.", and "mr." all in the same database. When I migrate your data from another system, I can automatically remap your prefixes/suffixes to standardize them, drop bogus prefixes/suffixes, and add unusual but legit prefixes/suffixes to your CiviCRM list.

You should have in your ownCloud folder (or an e-mail from me) two files - one called "invalid prefixes.csv" and the other "invalid suffixes.csv". Please open them in a spreadsheet program (Excel, LibreOffice Calc, Google Spreadsheets, etc.) and place the following in column B:

• If it is a valid prefix/suffix, please put "keep" in column 2.
• If it's an invalid prefix/suffix, please put "blank" in column 2.
• If it needs to be changed to something else, please put the new value in column 2.

Please see the remapping below for inspiration on standardizing!

Special note on Salsa¶

If you're migrating from Salsa, you'll see a lot of job titles in the "Prefix" field. This is because in Salsa, this field is called "Title", which is confusing to folks. Unfortunately, since the field is intended for prefixes, it's limited to 16 characters - so there's not even any sense in trying to move that info into a job title field. Just blank those!