MatchRatingApproach matches when it shouldn't

[David-Maisonave]

I'm using the latest source code from Phonix as of 5-Aug-2025.

I tested MatchRatingApproach with word "been" against the following words:
being
bin
bean
flat
xxxx

All 5 return true.
"flat" and "xxxx" should have return false.

I perform the same test with Metaphone, DoubleMetaphone, and CaverPhone. They correctly return false for "flat" and "xxxx".

Here's my source code.

        public static bool MatchRatingApproach(this string source1, string source2)
        {
            string[] sources = { source1,  source2 };
            return matchRatingApproach.IsSimilar(sources);
        }

FYI:
Metaphone, DoubleMetaphone, and CaverPhone all fail when comparing "being", in that they return false.
However, I'm not surprise, because all of the other phonetic functions I've tested have also failed with that word, except for Microsoft EnPhonetic function.

[David-Maisonave]

I fixed my own copy of this class in my code by adding the following functions.

        public bool IsSimilar(string source1, string source2)
        {
            int isSimilar = MatchRatingCompute(source1, source2);
            if (isSimilar == 0)
                return false;
            return true;
        }

In my test it returns a match for being, bin, bean, and return false for flat and xxxx.

While this is not a perfect results, because bin and bean should have failed, but most phonetic functions I've tested give similar results.
MatchRatingApproach is only the second algorithm I found that passes the "been" <> "being" comparison.

Here's a potential fix for your copy of the class.

        public bool IsSimilar(string[] words)
        {
            if (words.Length < 2)
            {
                throw new ArgumentException("Should be more than 1 word", "words");
            }

            int[] encoders = new int[words.Length - 1];

            for (var i = 0; i < words.Length - 1; i++)
            {
                encoders[i] = MatchRatingCompute(words[i + 1], words[i]);
            }

            for (int i = 0; i < encoders.Length - 1; i++)
            {
                if (encoders[i] != encoders[i + 1] || encoders[i] == 0)
                {
                    return false;
                }
            }

            return true;
        }    

I only changed the following if (encoders[i] != encoders[i + 1] || encoders[i] == 0).

I did a full test on the version I needed for my code, but I haven't tested the above version.