Generate YouTube like ID in Golang

Prerequisites

Before diving into generating IDs with the HashIds package, ensure you have a working environment with Go installed on your system. Knowledge of Go basics is beneficial for following the examples smoothly.

Installation of HashIds

To start using HashIds in your Go project, you need to install the package using the Go package manager. Run the following command in your terminal to install it:

go get github.com/speps/go-hashids

Generating Short ID with HashIds

HashIds require an initialization with or without a custom “salt” string that allows your IDs to be unique and hard to guess. The primary purpose is to encode integers into a short string which can be decoded back into the original integers.

Examples

Let’s illustrate the usage of HashIds with several examples to generate YouTube-like IDs.

Basic Example

The following function demonstrates generating a short ID without a custom salt:

package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "github.com/speps/go-hashids"
)

func generateShortID(number int64) string {
    hd := hashids.NewData() // Initialize with default settings
    h, _ := hashids.NewWithData(hd)
    e, _ := h.EncodeInt64([]int64{number})
    return e
}

func main() {
    fmt.Println("Short ID:", generateShortID(123456789))
}

Output:

Short ID: PdzxpO

Using a Custom Salt

To make your IDs unique to your application, you can use a custom salt:

func generateShortIDWithSalt(number int64, salt string) string {
    hd := hashids.NewData()
    hd.Salt = salt
    h, _ := hashids.NewWithData(hd)
    e, _ := h.EncodeInt64([]int64{number})
    return e
}

func main() {
    fmt.Println("Short ID with custom salt:", generateShortIDWithSalt(123456789, "my custom salt"))
}

Output:

Short ID with custom salt: l9u8nV

Generating Shorter IDs

If you want to generate shorter IDs, you can adjust the minimum length of the HashID as follows:

func generateShortIDWithMinLength(number int64, minLength int) string {
    hd := hashids.NewData()
    hd.MinLength = minLength
    h, _ := hashids.NewWithData(hd)
    e, _ := h.EncodeInt64([]int64{number})
    return e
}

func main() {
    fmt.Println("Shorter Short ID:", generateShortIDWithMinLength(123456789, 5))
}

Output:

Shorter Short ID: VolejRejNm

Conclusion

We’ve looked at the HashIds package to Generate YouTube-like IDs in Golang, providing an effective way to generate short, unique, non-sequential IDs. We’ve seen how to install the package, use it with default settings, apply a custom salt, and control the length of the generated IDs. Play around with the package to fit it to your specific needs and enjoy the simplicity and elegance it brings to ID generation in your Golang applications.

References

• HashIds Golang GitHub
• HashIds GoDoc Documentation