>For what it's worth, this is what I'm doing in foxpro
>
>I have an extra field that is equal to the original field with
>(1) All non-alpha and non-digits stripped ( including your quotes)
>(2) All accents dropped (grave, aigue, circonflex, cedille, ...)
>(3) then converted to uppercase
>
>
>eg
>

>Jean d'Éléphant 
>
>becomes
>
>JEANDELEPHANT
>

>
>
>
>
>I do the same with the expression to search
>
>The query is simpler then

Yes, this is what I had in mind.

Thanks for confirming.