The implementation of "soundslilke" is broken in more than one respect. The conversion of a word to a Soundex string is provided by org.mvel2.util.Soundex.
(.) There are words where Soundex.soundex returns null, so that the calling code, in Drools, crashes with a NPE.
(.) The algorithm implemented in Soundex is erroneous. I'm not sure which Soundex algorithm it is supposed to implement, but it just doesn't meet the basic requirements.

I have implemented, correctly, the version for the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) rule set for the official implementation of Soundex used by the U.S. Government.

Do we wait for MVEL to correct this bug, or do we just replace it with a correct implementation?

Regards
Wolfgang