Name order?

Just to make sure i have it right, with Japanese names when we tag the picture the surname is listed first, right? Just want to make sure I do not correct what may not need correcting when i run across what looks like the wrong name order.

If I'm remembering this correctly, we do it based on the order that is presented in the original work, which for Japanese names is usually surname and then given name. The catch is the "usually" part, as a series may have the characters officially with a given name and then surname ordering, even if it the name is Japanese or Japanese sounding. In those cases we'd go in the order the creator used, which is given name and then surname.

From the howto:tag wiki:

New Character Tags. Always use the character's full name in your tags. Name order should appear the same as in the original materials. Commonly:

• SurName_FirstName for Asians. Example: Shameimaru_Aya, where Shameimaru is her surname.
• FirstName_SurName for Westerners, and most other ethnicities. Example: Ken_Masters.

Excuse me. Isn't souryuu asuka langley german? Pretty sure that counts as western.
Wait, the wiki says "mixed japanese and german, technically american"
Isn't that way more western than asian?

You use whatever name order is used in the original source language, which for asuka is 惣流・アスカ・ラングレー , so souryuu asuka langley is correct. Ethnicity means nothing.

I think there used to be a rule stating that you decide the order by the surname, when the character is of mixed origin and has a name reflecting this.

Asian surname -> Asian order.

Western surname - > western order.

As an example, スオマ オッコネン looks perfectly Japanese, but is actually Finnish.

Then there's Shion Uzuki, which was sur-given until the Japanese official sites were cited for given-sur.