Hash string into RGB color

Question

Is there a best practice on how to hash an arbitrary string into a RGB color value? Or to be more general: to 3 bytes.

You\'re asking: When will I ever need this? It doe

Answer 1

A good hash function will provide a near uniform distribution over the key space. This reduces the question to how do I convert a random 32 bit number to a 3 byte RGB space. I see nothing wrong with just taking the low 3 bytes.

int hash = string.getHashCode();
int r = (hash & 0xFF0000) >> 16;
int g = (hash & 0x00FF00) >> 8;
int b = hash & 0x0000FF;