Originally Posted by vanblah

Slight threadjack: I hate hyphenated last names -- at least from a practical viewpoint.

I am responsible for creating accounts (email and network access) where I work. Our policy is "lastname + first initial" for account names (John Smith = smithj@company.com).

We had a couple of names this year that give me carpal tunnel pain just thinking about them. We are talking compound, hyphenated loooong last names; for example: John Van Crackengeshenckmeyer-Del Rio de Loco is vancrackengeshenckmeyer-delriodelocoj@company.com. OK, so that is a little extreme but you get the point.

Rather than hyphenate your last name because you are so progressive and don't want the woman to lose her identity how 'bout being REALLY uber-progressive and don't change your last name at all? Or better yet, be as hip as humanly possible and take a few letters from each of your last names to create a new one! We have a married couple here who did that.

Sorry about the threadjack ... and yeah: when in doubt refer to both parties by the full name.