User management issues

Greetings,

I’ve scoured the forums but I can’t seem to find answers to two issues I have with the way WP organizes users.

1. Main user page (wp-admin/users.php): Users are apparently listed alphabetically by name. However, if there’s more than 50 or so users, a new page is created—but instead of a continuous alphabetical list, the next page starts over with “A”. Really stupid.

2. No way to sort lists, either in admin or on site, by user’s LAST name. Although first_name and last_name fields are present in the wp_usermeta table, there doesn’t seem to be any built-in ability for WP to use this data when calling users, e.g. in wp_list_authors

Any ideas on resolving either of these two issues?

*semi-rant*

In North America, Europe, & other European-origin countries, it’s standard practice to list people alphabetically by their last name, not their first—whether the format is “first name last name” or “last name, first name.” The ability to do this should really be part of the core functionality, not something to be hacked or added onto with a plugin.

There is also the internationalization issue with the terms “first name” and “last name.” These are terms common for European-origin naming systems, but not for many Asian naming conventions. See Richard Ishida on this subject: Personal names around the world 1

And an article with specific suggestions for data design considerations:

Internationalization of Names

Thanks for listening 😉

*edit*

To be helpful rather than critical:

1. Allow more than two name fields, and let the user enter as many as desired. Three would be good, four might be better. Leave off culturally-biased labels like “first name” and “last name”

2. In addition to the “display name publicly as:” dropdown, add a “sort name by:” dropdown.