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Re: Collections

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From:
'Brian Ingerson'
Date:
October 1, 2002 11:35
Subject:
Re: Collections
Message ID:
20021001113523.B23219@ttul.org
[repost: mail server problems]

On 30/09/02 16:41 -0700, Brent Dax wrote:
> 'Brian Ingerson':
> #     then you call the internal HASH (storable->md5 or 
> 
> I have one more concern.  I don't know the details of MD5, so I don't
> know how remote this possibility is, but what if two different data
> structures MD5 out the same?  Like I said, I don't know much about MD5,
> but it would seem to me that any time you reduce a ton of arbitrary
> strings to thirty-two hexits, you'll get a collision at least once or
> twice.

2**128 is a big number. Supposedly MD5s distribute very widely for similar
sources. MD5 might even be overkill. I don't really know. 

Anyway, this is just one optimized algorithm. There's different ways to skin
this cat. This was just off the top of my head, and makes a nice prototype.

Cheers, Brian

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