hash function
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AI overview
A hash function is a mathematical tool that takes in data of any size and converts it into a fixed-size output, like turning a long document into a short code. This is useful because it allows computers to quickly organize, verify, and manage large amounts of information efficiently.
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Article
A hash function that maps names to integers from 0 to 15. There is a collision between keys "John Smith" and "Sandra Dee".
A hash function is any function that can be used to map data of arbitrary size to fixed-size values, though there are some hash functions that support variable-length output. The values returned by a hash function are called hash values, hash codes, (hash/message) digests, or simply hashes. The values are usually used to index a fixed-size table called a hash table. Use of a hash function to index a hash table is called hashing or scatter-storage addressing.