Efficient method to generate UUID String in JAVA (

Question

I would like an efficient utility to generate unique sequences of bytes. UUID is a good candidate but UUID.randomUUID().toString() generates stuff like 44e128a5-ac7a-4c9a-be4c-224b6bf81b20 which is good as long as you don't need to transmit it over HTTP, in which case the dashes need to be removed.

I'm looking for an efficient way to generate a random strings, only from alphanumeric characters (no dashes or any other special symbols).

Answer 1

I used JUG (Java UUID Generator) to generate unique ID. It is unique across JVMs. Pretty good to use. Here is the code for your reference:

private static final SecureRandom secureRandom = new SecureRandom();
private static final UUIDGenerator generator = UUIDGenerator.getInstance();

public synchronized static String generateUniqueId() {
  UUID uuid = generator.generateRandomBasedUUID(secureRandom);

  return uuid.toString().replaceAll("-", "").toUpperCase();
}

You could download the library from: https://github.com/cowtowncoder/java-uuid-generator

Answer 2

I have just copied UUID toString() method and just updated it to remove "-" from it. It will be much more faster and straight forward than any other solution

public String generateUUIDString(UUID uuid) {
    return (digits(uuid.getMostSignificantBits() >> 32, 8) +
            digits(uuid.getMostSignificantBits() >> 16, 4) +
            digits(uuid.getMostSignificantBits(), 4) +
            digits(uuid.getLeastSignificantBits() >> 48, 4) +
            digits(uuid.getLeastSignificantBits(), 12));
}

/** Returns val represented by the specified number of hex digits. */
private String digits(long val, int digits) {
    long hi = 1L << (digits * 4);
    return Long.toHexString(hi | (val & (hi - 1))).substring(1);
}

Usage:

generateUUIDString(UUID.randomUUID())

Another implementation using reflection

public String generateString(UUID uuid) throws NoSuchMethodException, InvocationTargetException, IllegalAccessException {

    if (uuid == null) {
        return "";
    }

    Method digits = UUID.class.getDeclaredMethod("digits", long.class, int.class);
    digits.setAccessible(true);

    return ( (String) digits.invoke(uuid, uuid.getMostSignificantBits() >> 32, 8) +
            digits.invoke(uuid, uuid.getMostSignificantBits() >> 16, 4) +
            digits.invoke(uuid, uuid.getMostSignificantBits(), 4) +
            digits.invoke(uuid, uuid.getLeastSignificantBits() >> 48, 4) +
            digits.invoke(uuid, uuid.getLeastSignificantBits(), 12));

}