stduuid

A C++ cross-platform single-header library implementation for universally unique identifiers, simply know as either UUID or GUID (mostly on Windows). A UUID is a 128-bit number used to uniquely identify information in computer systems, such as database table keys, COM interfaces, classes and type libraries, and many others.

For information about UUID/GUIDs see:

• Universally unique identifier
• A Universally Unique IDentifier (UUID) URN Namespace

Library overview

Although the specification puts the uuid library in the std namespace, this implementation uses the namespace uuids for this purpose, in order to make the library usable without violating the restrictions imposed on the std namespace. The following types and utilities are available:

Basic types:

Name	Description
uuid	a class representing a UUID; this can be default constructed (a nil UUID), constructed from a range (defined by a pair of iterators), or from a string.
uuid_variant	a strongly type enum representing the type of a UUID
uuid_version	a strongly type enum representing the version of a UUID

Generators:

Name	Description
uuid_system_generator	a function object that generates new UUIDs using operating system resources (CoCreateGuid on Windows, uuid_generate on Linux, CFUUIDCreate on Mac)
basic_uuid_random_generator	a function object that generates version 4 UUIDs using a pseudo-random number generator engine.
uuid_random_generator	a basic_uuid_random_generator using the Marsenne Twister engine, i.e. basic_uuid_random_generator<std::mt19937>
uuid_name_generator	a function object that generates version 5, name-based UUIDs using SHA1 hashing.

Utilities:

Name	Description
std::swap<>	specialization of swap for uuid
std::hash<>	specialization of hash for uuid (necessary for storing UUIDs in unordered associative containers, such as std::unordered_set)

Other:

Name	Description
operator== and operator!=	for UUIDs comparison for equality/inequality
operator<	for comparing whether one UUIDs is less than another. Although this operation does not make much logical sense, it is necessary in order to store UUIDs in a std::set.
operator<<	to write a UUID to an output stream using the canonical textual representation.
to_string()	creates a std::string with the canonical textual representation of a UUID.
to_wstring()	creates a std::wstring with the canonical textual representation of a UUID.

This project is currently under development and should be ignored until further notice.

Library history

This library is an implementation of the proposal P0959. As the proposal evolves based on the standard commity and the C++ community feedback, this library implementation will reflect those changes.

Revision 1

Changes from the first draft:

• Removed string constructors and replaced with free overloaded function from_string().
• Parsing strings to uuid throws exception uuid_error instead of creating a nil uuid when the operation fails.
• {} included in the supported format, i.e. {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}.
• Removed state_size.
• Rename member function nil() to is_nil().
• The default constructor is defaulted.
• Added a conversion construct from std::span<uint_8, 16>.
• Added the free function as_bytes() to convert the uuid into a view of its underlying bytes.
• Constructing a uuid from a range with a size other than 16 is undefined behaviour.
• Removed mutable iterators (but preserved the constant iterators).
• Removed typedefs and others container-like parts.

Using the library

The following is a list of examples for using the library:

• Creating a nil UUID

uuid empty;
assert(empty.is_nil());
assert(empty.size() == 16);

• Creating a new UUID

uuid const id = uuids::uuid_system_generator{}();
assert(!id.is_nil());
assert(id.size() == 16);
assert(id.version() == uuids::uuid_version::random_number_based);
assert(id.variant() == uuids::uuid_variant::rfc);

• Creating a new UUID with a default random generator

uuids::uuid_random_generator gen;
uuid const id = gen();
assert(!id.is_nil());
assert(id.size() == 16);
assert(id.version() == uuids::uuid_version::random_number_based);
assert(id.variant() == uuids::uuid_variant::rfc);

• Creating a new UUID with a particular random generator

std::random_device rd;
std::ranlux48_base generator(rd());
uuids::basic_uuid_random_generator<std::ranlux48_base> gen(&generator);
uuid const id = gen();
assert(!id.is_nil());
assert(id.size() == 16);
assert(id.version() == uuids::uuid_version::random_number_based);
assert(id.variant() == uuids::uuid_variant::rfc);

• Creating a new UUID with the name generator

uuids::uuid_name_generator gen;
uuid const id = gen();

assert(!id.is_nil());
assert(id.size() == 16);
assert(id.version() == uuids::uuid_version::name_based_sha1);
assert(id.variant() == uuids::uuid_variant::rfc);

• Create a UUID from a string

using namespace std::string_literals;

auto str = "47183823-2574-4bfd-b411-99ed177d3e43"s;
uuid id(from_string(str));
assert(uuids::to_string(id) == str);

// or

uuid id(from_string(L"{47183823-2574-4bfd-b411-99ed177d3e43}"s));
assert(id.wstring() == str);

• Creating a UUID from sequence of 16 bytes

std::array<uuids::uuid::value_type, 16> arr{{
   0x47, 0x18, 0x38, 0x23,
   0x25, 0x74,
   0x4b, 0xfd,
   0xb4, 0x11,
   0x99, 0xed, 0x17, 0x7d, 0x3e, 0x43}};
uuid id(arr);

assert(uuids::to_string(id) == "47183823-2574-4bfd-b411-99ed177d3e43");

// or

uuids::uuid::value_type arr[16] = {
   0x47, 0x18, 0x38, 0x23,
   0x25, 0x74,
   0x4b, 0xfd,
   0xb4, 0x11,
   0x99, 0xed, 0x17, 0x7d, 0x3e, 0x43 };
uuid id(std::begin(arr), std::end(arr));
assert(uuids::to_string(id) == "47183823-2574-4bfd-b411-99ed177d3e43");

• Comparing UUIDs

uuid empty;
uuid id = uuids::uuid_system_generator{}();
assert(empty == empty);
assert(id == id);
assert(empty != id);

• Swapping UUIDs

uuid empty;
uuid id = uuids::uuid_system_generator{}();

assert(empty.is_nil());
assert(!id.is_nil());

std::swap(empty, id);

assert(!empty.is_nil());
assert(id.is_nil());

empty.swap(id);

assert(empty.is_nil());
assert(!id.is_nil());

• Converting to string

uuid empty;
assert(uuids::to_string(empty) == "00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000");
assert(uuids::to_wstring(empty) == L"00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000");

• Iterating through the UUID data

std::array<uuids::uuid::value_type, 16> arr{{
   0x47, 0x18, 0x38, 0x23,
   0x25, 0x74,
   0x4b, 0xfd,
   0xb4, 0x11,
   0x99, 0xed, 0x17, 0x7d, 0x3e, 0x43}};

uuid id(arr);

size_t i = 0;
for (auto const & b : id)
   assert(arr[i++] == b);

• Using with an orderered associative container

uuids::uuid_random_generator gen;
std::set<uuids::uuid> ids{uuid{}, gen(), gen(), gen(), gen()};

assert(ids.size() == 5);
assert(ids.find(uuid{}) != ids.end());

• Using in an unordered associative container

uuids::uuid_random_generator gen;
std::unordered_set<uuids::uuid> ids{uuid{}, gen(), gen(), gen(), gen()};

assert(ids.size() == 5);
assert(ids.find(uuid{}) != ids.end());

• Hashing UUIDs

using namespace std::string_literals;
auto str = "47183823-2574-4bfd-b411-99ed177d3e43"s;
uuid id(from_string(str));

auto h1 = std::hash<std::string>{};
auto h2 = std::hash<uuid>{};
assert(h1(str) == h2(id));

Support

The library is supported on all major operating systems: Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

Dependencies

Because no major compiler supports std::span yet the Microsoft Guidelines Support Library (aka GSL) is used for its span implementation (from which the standard version was defined).

Testing

A testing project is available in the sources. To build and execute the tests do the following:

• Clone or download this repository
• Create a build directory in the root directory of the sources
• Run the command cmake .. from the build directory; if you do not have CMake you must install it first.
• Build the project created in the previous step
• Run the executable.

Credits

The SHA1 implementation is based on the TinySHA1 library.