Can you check if a name is available while playing the game?

sometimes while playing Ill think of a name for a new toon and want to see if its available.

Is there a way to see if its available without having to exit the game?
thanks

/getglobalname name

This will return the global name of the person who owns the name, or "@name is not online" if nobody owns it.

The latter result is not foolproof. On Victory, /getglobalname Roderick will return "@Roderick is not online.", but that name isn't free - my global is the same as the name of my main. Also, someone who's hidden may return the same result.

Sometimes, you'll get no result at all. Every time this has happened to me, the name has been in use. I assume it's a name that was taken and the account canceled before the global name system was added, meaning that the character has no global.

There is no way to check a name and get the "available"/"in use"/"not available" message from the Check Name button.

/friend SuperAwesomeGuy will tell you if the name is taken (because you can only friend existing characters). You can't friend characters of an opposite faction, but it should give you an error message if you try (which would tell you that the name is taken on the opposite side).

Interesting. I never use the /friend system (I prefer global friends), so I didn't know it could be used that way. I'll have to remember that; it's easier than figuring out what the return from /getglobalname is telling you.

Speaking of which, being nearly 7 years old, isn't it time for a 2nd name sweep? I know they mentioned something awhile ago that sounded like they frowned on the idea.