On Sat, 20 Feb 2010 11:52:05 +0100
Goswin von Brederlow <goswin-v-b@web.de> wrote:

> Grégoire Seux <kamaradclimber@gmail.com> writes:
> 
> > hello !
> >
> > i would like to use the polymorhpic hash function on strings. But i would like
> > to know what is the probability of a collision between two hashes. 
> >
> > my first question is about the range of the Hashtbl.hash function: what is its
> > range ? ( string -> [1..N] ?)
> 
> It is range [min_int..max_int]. Meaning 31 or 63 bits.
> 
> > the second question is : can i assume that the result is a uniform distribution
> > over [1..N] ? (for 10? words which is an estimation of the english vocabulary
> > size)

The best way is to test yourself. Or rely on someone else's tests :)

http://alaska-kamtchatka.blogspot.com/2009/06/hash-n-mix.html
 
> You can read the source, analyze the math and try to figure out a
> collision. From past experience every widely used hash function so far
> has been shown to be vulnerable. Like md5 is now considered compromised
> due to the ease of creating a collision. Sha1 is deemed unsafe too. It
> is just a matter of how much brainpower and cpu time you want to throw
> at it. Or pure bad luck.

Hashtbl.hash function is not required to be cryptographically strong, but rather
uniformly random on "usual" input data and fast.

-- 
 ygrek
 http://ygrek.org.ua