# FullName field in Geography tree

**URL:** https://speciforum.org/t/fullname-field-in-geography-tree/4049
**Category:** Get Help
**Created:** [August 19, 2026, 8:13am UTC](https://speciforum.org/t/fullname-field-in-geography-tree/4049 "2026-08-19T08:13:49Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![sorosoro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5f9b8f/32.png) [@sorosoro](https://speciforum.org/u/sorosoro)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2026, 8:13am UTC](https://speciforum.org/t/fullname-field-in-geography-tree/4049/1 "2026-08-19T08:13:49Z")

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Hi,

I am wondering how is the FullName field in the Geography tree calculated. I thought this field concatenates the values in the Name field for parents and children and I expected that updating the Name field for a country, for example, would automatically update the FullName for that country and all its children, but that’s not the case. What am I missing?

We have Specify 7 Version: v7.11.4 ( I know! Old. We haven’t been able to upgrade to the newest version.)

Thanks,

Soraya

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### Author: ![Grant](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/speciforum.org/grant/32/4255_2.png) [@Grant](https://speciforum.org/u/Grant)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2026, 5:03pm UTC](https://speciforum.org/t/fullname-field-in-geography-tree/4049/2 "2026-08-20T17:03:28Z")

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Hi @sorosoro,

Thank you for your question!

The `FullName` field is constructed using the [tree definition](https://speciforum.org/t/editing-tree-definitions-ranks/1783) settings, so when the Name field is edited, the change should automatically propagate to it, unless the nodes impacted or updated have been _[synonymized](https://speciforum.org/t/synonyms-and-synonymy-in-specify/2725)_, which would prevent updates.

In my testing, changes to a parent are immediately visible downstream in the `FullName` field of children on `v7.12.0.7` and our upcoming release `v7.12.1`. Can you include screenshots or query results demonstrating this discrepancy?

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### Author: ![sorosoro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5f9b8f/32.png) [@sorosoro](https://speciforum.org/u/sorosoro)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2026, 7:26am UTC](https://speciforum.org/t/fullname-field-in-geography-tree/4049/3 "2026-08-21T07:26:55Z")

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Hi Grant, thanks a lot for your reply!

It works well, a change in the parent is reflected right away in the FullName field when I do it in Specify.

I got confused because I changed the names of many countries (to the german name) directly in the backend and those changes do propagate to the FullName… Doh! 😳Sorry, I should have seen that earlier!

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### Author: ![system](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/uploads/specifysoftware/original/2X/1/18a843c97bc32b40e8ad0e035755bc88ffaacaf7.svg) [@system](https://speciforum.org/u/system)
#### Post date: [August 28, 2026, 7:27am UTC](https://speciforum.org/t/fullname-field-in-geography-tree/4049/4 "2026-08-28T07:27:33Z")

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