yogi_Identify Names With Similar First And Last Names

Yogi Anand, D.Eng, P.E.       Google Spreadsheet    Post  #711   Aug 22, 2012     www.energyefficientbuild.com.

user muchtolearn said: (http://productforums.google.com/forum/?zx=ahxxx0f1ye6h#!category-topic/docs/spreadsheets/HgTqZzflw08)
how to identify similar text strings 
I have a long list of names. Some of the names are the same people but they are listed slightly differently for example "John A. Smith" or "John Adam Smith". I want to do two things:

1) Use a script to detect possible same names. Perhaps using a script that detects if a certain percentage of letters are the same would work?

2) Then, I want to be presented with these possible matches and be able to decide if I want to change them to all have the same listing e.g. change all of the "John A. Smith" entries to "John Adam Smith" or to leave them the same if they are different names.   

Thanks!

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in the following I present the little play I have had with the question by user muchtolearn