Get unique integer value from string

Question

I have different unique strings in the same format. The string looks like this axf25!j&809>-11~dc and I want to get unique integer value from this string.

Answer 1

You can't guarantee unique integer values from different strings since there are more possible string representations than integers. You can use some well known/defined hashing algorithm to minimize the chance of a collision. You should look at MD5 or SHA.

The java class MessageDigest should be of some use.