metaphone

metaphone

Metaphone phonetic algorithm.

Contents

• What is this?
• When should I use this?
• Install
• Use
• API
  • metaphone(value)
• CLI
• Types
• Compatibility
• Related
• Contribute
• Security
• License

What is this?

This package exposes a phonetic algorithm. That means it gets a certain string (typically an English word), and turns it into a code, which can then be compared to other codes (of other words), to check if they are (likely) pronounced the same.

When should I use this?

You’re probably dealing with natural language, and know you need this, if you’re here!

Depending on your needs, double-metaphone might be better.

Depending on your goals, you likely want to additionally use a stemmer (such as stemmer).

Install

This package is ESM only. In Node.js (version 14.14+, 16.0+), install with npm:

npm install metaphone

In Deno with esm.sh:

import {metaphone} from 'https://esm.sh/metaphone@2'

In browsers with esm.sh:

<script type="module">
  import {metaphone} from 'https://esm.sh/metaphone@2?bundle'
</script>

Use

import {metaphone} from 'metaphone'

metaphone('michael') // => 'MXL'
metaphone('crevalle') // => 'KRFL'
metaphone('Filipowitz') // => 'FLPWTS'
metaphone('Xavier') // => 'SFR'
metaphone('delicious') // => 'TLSS'
metaphone('acceptingness') // => 'AKSPTNKNS'
metaphone('allegrettos') // => 'ALKRTS'

With stemmer:

import {metaphone} from 'metaphone'
import {stemmer} from 'stemmer'

metaphone(stemmer('acceptingness')) // => 'AKSPTNK'
metaphone(stemmer('allegrettos')) // => 'ALKRT'

API

This package exports the identifier metaphone. There is no default export.

metaphone(value)

Get the metaphone code from a given value.

value

Value to use (string, required).

Returns

Metaphone code for value (string).

CLI

Usage: metaphone [options] <words...>

Metaphone implementation

Options:

  -h, --help           output usage information
  -v, --version        output version number

Usage:

# output phonetics
$ metaphone considerations detestable
# KNSTRXNS TTSTBL

# output phonetics from stdin
$ echo 'hiccups vileness' | metaphone
# HKKPS FLNS

# with stemmer
$ echo 'vileness' | stemmer | metaphone
# FL

Types

This package is fully typed with TypeScript. It exports no additional types.

Compatibility

This package is at least compatible with all maintained versions of Node.js. As of now, that is Node.js 14.14+ and 16.0+. It also works in Deno and modern browsers.

Related

• double-metaphone — double metaphone algorithm
• soundex-code — soundex algorithm
• stemmer — porter stemmer algorithm
• dice-coefficient — sørensen–dice coefficient
• levenshtein-edit-distance — levenshtein edit distance
• syllable — syllable count of English words

Contribute

Yes please! See How to Contribute to Open Source.

Security

This package is safe.

License

MIT © Titus Wormer