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82 lines
2.8 KiB
82 lines
2.8 KiB
15 years ago
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.\" Copyright 1999 Andreas Dilger (adilger@enel.ucalgary.ca)
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.\"
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.\" This man page was created for libuuid.so.1.1 from e2fsprogs-1.14.
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.\"
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.\" This file may be copied under the terms of the GNU Public License.
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.\"
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.\" Created Wed Mar 10 17:42:12 1999, Andreas Dilger
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.TH UUID_GENERATE 3 "@E2FSPROGS_MONTH@ @E2FSPROGS_YEAR@" "E2fsprogs version @E2FSPROGS_VERSION@"
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.SH NAME
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uuid_generate, uuid_generate_random, uuid_generate_time \- create a new unique UUID value
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.SH SYNOPSIS
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.nf
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.B #include <uuid/uuid.h>
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.sp
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.BI "void uuid_generate(uuid_t " out );
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.BI "void uuid_generate_random(uuid_t " out );
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.BI "void uuid_generate_time(uuid_t " out );
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.fi
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.SH DESCRIPTION
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The
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.B uuid_generate
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function creates a new universally unique identifier (UUID). The uuid will
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be generated based on high-quality randomness from
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.IR /dev/urandom ,
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if available. If it is not available, then
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.B uuid_generate
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will use an alternative algorithm which uses the current time, the
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local ethernet MAC address (if available), and random data generated
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using a pseudo-random generator.
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.sp
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The
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.B uuid_generate_random
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function forces the use of the all-random UUID format, even if
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a high-quality random number generator (i.e.,
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.IR /dev/urandom )
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is not available, in which case a pseudo-random
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generator will be subsituted. Note that the use of a pseudo-random
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generator may compromise the uniqueness of UUID's
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generated in this fashion.
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.sp
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The
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.B uuid_generate_time
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function forces the use of the alternative algorithm which uses the
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current time and the local ethernet MAC address (if available).
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This algorithm used to be the default one used to generate UUID, but
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because of the use of the ethernet MAC address, it can leak
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information about when and where the UUID was generated. This can cause
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privacy problems in some applications, so the
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.B uuid_generate
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function only uses this algorithm if a high-quality source of
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randomness is not available.
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.sp
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The UUID is 16 bytes (128 bits) long, which gives approximately 3.4x10^38
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unique values (there are approximately 10^80 elemntary particles in
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the universe according to Carl Sagan's
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.IR Cosmos ).
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The new UUID can reasonably be considered unique among all UUIDs created
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on the local system, and among UUIDs created on other systems in the past
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and in the future.
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.SH RETURN VALUE
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The newly created UUID is returned in the memory location pointed to by
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.IR out .
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.SH "CONFORMING TO"
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OSF DCE 1.1
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.SH AUTHOR
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.B uuid_generate
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was written by Theodore Y. Ts'o for the ext2 filesystem utilties.
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.SH AVAILABILITY
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.B uuid_generate
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is part of libuuid from the e2fsprogs package and is available from
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http://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net.
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.SH "SEE ALSO"
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.BR libuuid (3),
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.BR uuid_clear (3),
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.BR uuid_compare (3),
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.BR uuid_copy (3),
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.BR uuidgen (1),
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.BR uuid_is_null (3),
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.BR uuid_parse (3),
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.BR uuid_time (3),
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.BR uuid_unparse (3)
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