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One way to find individual names in a vast list of names by scanning through survey comments that are written in string format is by using regular expressions. Regular expressions are patterns that can be used to search for specific strings and patterns within a larger text.

First, identify common patterns for individual names, such as capitalized first letters or common prefixes (e.g. Mr., Mrs., Dr.). Create a regular expression that fits these patterns, such as:

\b[A-Z][a-z]+\b

This regular expression searches for words that start with a capitalized letter, followed by one or more lowercase letters, and ends on a word boundary.

Then, use a programming language like Python or R to apply this regular expression to the survey comments and extract the matches. For example, in Python, you can use the re module:

import re

survey_comments = ["John said he was satisfied with the service.", "Dr. Smith provided great advice.", "I had a conversation with Ms. Rodriguez."]

name_pattern = r'\b[A-Z][a-z]+\b'

for comment in surveycomments: matches = re.findall(namepattern, comment) print(matches)

This code will output:

["John"] ["Dr.", "Smith"] ["Ms.", "Rodriguez"]

Note that the regular expression can also capture false positives, such as titles or common words that start with a capital letter. You may need to manually filter these out or refine the regular expression to be more specific.