UUID Functions(4.3)

Owned by Jenni Wallin
Aug 26, 2024

This section describes functions that facilitate creation and use of  immutable universally unique identifiers (UUID).

For general information about UUIDs, see https://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/api/java/util/UUID.html.

For information about the uuid type in , see Data Types(4.3).

uuidCreateFromHexString

This function takes a string representation of a UUID and converts it to the uuid type.

uuid uuidCreateFromHexString ( string aString )
ParameterDescription

uuidString

A string representation of a UUID

Returns

A UUID based on the input string

The format of the string is validated but not the content. The function returns null if the format of the string is incorrect.

Example - uuidCreateFromHexString

The following example converts a string to a UUID:

uuid getUuid (string s) {
 uuid u = uuidCreateFromHexString(s);
 if(u==null) {
  //Incorrect UUID format
 } 
 return u;
} 

uuidCreateRandom

This function generates a random UUID.

uuid uuidCreateRandom ( void )
ParameterDescription

Returns

A version 4 UUID (randomly generated UUID)

Example - uuidCreateRandom

The following example creates a random UUID:

uuid getUuid() {
    return uuidCreateRandom();   
}

uuidGetVersion

This function returns the version of a UUID. The version number describes the type of the UUID, e g time-based, DCE security, name-based, and randomly generated UUID. For instance, a UUID generated by the function uuidCreateRandom is 4 (randomly generated UUID).

int uuidGetVersion ( uuid aUuid )
ParameterDescription
aUuidThe UUID for which you want to retrieve the version.

Returns

The version of the UUID, or -1 if the UUID in the argument is null.

Example - uuidGetVersion

The following example retrieves the version from a UUID:

uuid getUuid (string s) {
    uuid u = uuidCreateFromHexString(s);
    if(u==null) {
        debug("Incorrect UUID format");
    } else if (uuidGetVersion(u)<0) {
        debug("Invalid UUID");
    }
    return u;
}

uuidString

This function converts a UUID to a string. 

string uuidString ( aUuid )
ParameterDescription
aUuidThe UUID that you want to convert

Returns

The UUID represented as a string

Example - uuidString

The result of the following two examples are identical:

uuid aUuid = uuidCreateRandom();
string s = (string) aUuid;
uuid aUuid = uuidCreateRandom();
string s = uuidString(aUuid);