String to unique integer hashing

Question

I\'m trying to develop a system that can change my string into a unique integral value, meaning say for example the word \"account\" has an encrypted numerical value of 0891

Answer 1

For uniqueness, start with assigning primes to the letters: A -> 2, B -> 3, C -> 5, D -> 7 etc.

To calculate the "key" of a given letter in a word, raise the prime to the power of the position index in the word. To get the "key" of the whole word, multiply all the letter keys together.

For example the word CAB:

C -> 5 ^ 1 = 5
A -> 2 ^ 2 = 4
B -> 3 ^ 3 = 81
CAB -> 5 * 4 * 81 =  1620.

No other word will ever give you 1620 as a key.

Note: you don't have to start with A -> 2 or assign primes to the characters of the alphabet in order as long as you keep track of the mapping. Also bear in mind that the results of this will get large very quickly.

However, bear in mind the other comments about security - this is not a particularly secure algorithm.