Entity resolution
Deciding which records refer to the same real-world person, company, or thing, when no shared identifier says so.
Also called record linkage or identity resolution. It weighs evidence across several fields, because any one field, a name especially, is rarely enough.
Where it comes up
- Near-duplicate recordsTwo rows describe the same real thing but differ enough that an exact comparison misses them.
- Name variantsThe same person or organization appears under several spellings, orders, and abbreviations.
See also
- DeduplicationFinding records that describe the same real thing and reducing them to one.
- Fuzzy matchingComparing two pieces of text for similarity instead of exact equality, so that Jon Smith and John Smith count as close.
- Primary keyA column, or set of columns, whose value is unique for every row and identifies it: a customer number, an order ID.