Character Names Final Draft 7

I've got FD6 but I'm sure it's similar. On the menu bar, go to Edit -> Find and in the dialog box there's options to replace words. I normally do it twice, I tick the Match Case box and then replace Jim with Bob and then JIM with BOB and choose Replace All. That should avoid any nasty capitalisation issues. You can't undo replaces so save your document first. If you make a mistake, close it without saving and re-open.

One more point

You also need to tick the "Whole Words Only" option.

If you do not, you will get things like:

Original:

Jim goes to sleep.

Jimmying the lock, he looks around carefully.

Replaced version:

Bob goes to sleep.

Bobmying the lock, he looks around carefully.

The "whole words" option seems to understand that Jim's is Jim + 's and will replace only the Jim part of Jim's.

Doh! You're right, CB. I've had that problem before with apostrophes as well.

I'm old school with my s-ending names (James' rather than James's) which can also cause problems. Eg; James' becomes Tom'.

Not the end of the world but it's probably a good idea to have a close read through following any global changes.

Good call.

I changed Aileen to Arden.

Then I changed it back to Aileen. Unfortunately, I use the word 'garden' a lot.

Ended up with a lot of gAileens. That was fun.