guid

NAME

Guid - Produce GUID/UUID from Ruby

SYNOPSIS

require 'guid'

generate a GUID

g = Guid.new puts g # 79328095-636a-6cc5-2bbb-606df7228a01 puts g.to_s # 79328095-636a-6cc5-2bbb-606df7228a01 puts g.hexdigest # 79328095636a6cc52bbb606df7228a01 puts g.raw.inspect # "\227#\010Y6\246\306\\262\273\006\326\177"\250\020" puts g.raw.length # 16

generate another GUID, should be different everytime

g2 = Guid.new puts g == g2 # false (it better be! :-)

convert a hexstring into Guid object

g3 = Guid.from_s("79328095-636a-6cc5-2bbb-606df7228a01") puts g3 # 79328095-636a-6cc5-2bbb-606df7228a01 puts g == g3 # true

convert a raw 16-byte string into Guid object

g4 = Guid.from_raw("\227#\010Y6\246\306\\262\273\006\326\177"\250\020") puts g4 # 79328095-636a-6cc5-2bbb-606df7228a01 puts g == g4 # true

DESCRIPTION

This library can produce GUID/UUID on Windows (except first release of Win95 and older version) and on Unix using random number. I have only tested this library under Win2k and Redhat 7.3; please report if you fail to use it on other platforms. On Windows, it uses CryptGenRandom(). On Unix, it uses /dev/urandom (and if fail, try to use /dev/random). No other external program or library is needed.

The latest version of this library can be obtained from:

http://rubyforge.org/projects/uuid/

To install:

% ruby install.rb config
% ruby install.rb setup
# ruby install.rb install

SEE ALSO

• FAQ

CREDITS

• Thanks to Stephen Veit for pointing out how to use Win32API.

LICENSE

Copyright (c) 2004 David Garamond .

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Ruby itself.