Understanding UUIDs: Why Integers Are No Longer Enough

The Problem with Auto-Incrementing IDs

For decades, databases used simple integers (1, 2, 3...) as primary keys. This works fine for a single server. But in the era of cloud computing and distributed databases, integer keys cause massive headaches:

• Collisions: If two different servers try to create ID #100, data gets corrupted.
• Security: If a user sees their ID is 500, they can guess that user 499 exists. This "enumeration attack" reveals the size of your customer base.

Enter the UUID

A UUID (Universally Unique Identifier) is a 128-bit number that looks like this: 550e8400-e29b-41d4-a716-446655440000. The probability of generating two identical UUIDs is so astronomically low that for all practical purposes, it is zero.

Benefits of UUIDs

• Decentralization: You can generate a valid ID on the client-side (browser or mobile app) before even sending data to the server.
• Security: They are non-sequential, making them impossible to guess.
• Merging: You can merge records from different databases without conflict.

Generating UUIDs Instantly

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For other security needs, such as hashing sensitive data, check out our Hash Generator.

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