[jira] [Commented] (RNG-54) StringSampler

["Gilles (JIRA)" <ji...@apache.org>]

    [ https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/RNG-54?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel&focusedCommentId=16616743#comment-16616743 ] 

Gilles commented on RNG-54:
---------------------------

Yet another alternative for functionalities that depend on pseudo-random generation would be to hold them in module {{commons-rng-examples}} until a decision is made where they should end up.
What I would like to avoid is having "Commons RNG" maintain duplicate functionalities which users would look for somewhere else.

bq. There is currently no equivalent for the function {{org.apache.commons.math3.random.RandomDataGenerator.nextHexString(int)}}.

Indeed {{nextHexString}} is something that seems odd to look for in a math library.


> StringSampler
> -------------
>
>                 Key: RNG-54
>                 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/RNG-54
>             Project: Commons RNG
>          Issue Type: Improvement
>          Components: sampling
>    Affects Versions: 1.1
>            Reporter: Alex D Herbert
>            Priority: Minor
>
> There is currently no equivalent for the function {{org.apache.commons.math3.random.RandomDataGenerator.nextHexString(int)}}.
> Here is the original version adapted to use the {{UniformRandomProvider:}}
> {code:java}
> public String nextHexStringOriginal(UniformRandomProvider ran, int len) {
>     // Initialize output buffer
>     StringBuilder outBuffer = new StringBuilder();
>     // Get int(len/2)+1 random bytes
>     byte[] randomBytes = new byte[(len / 2) + 1];
>     ran.nextBytes(randomBytes);
>     // Convert each byte to 2 hex digits
>     for (int i = 0; i < randomBytes.length; i++) {
>         Integer c = Integer.valueOf(randomBytes[i]);
>         /*
>          * Add 128 to byte value to make interval 0-255 before doing hex conversion.
>          * This guarantees <= 2 hex digits from toHexString() toHexString would
>          * otherwise add 2^32 to negative arguments.
>          */
>         String hex = Integer.toHexString(c.intValue() + 128);
>         // Make sure we add 2 hex digits for each byte
>         if (hex.length() == 1) {
>             hex = "0" + hex;
>         }
>         outBuffer.append(hex);
>     }
>     return outBuffer.toString().substring(0, len);
> }
> {code}
> Note: I removed the length check to make the speed test (see below) fair.
> This makes use of {{StringBuider}} and is not very efficient. I have created a version based on the Hex encoding within {{org.apache.commons.codec.digest.DigestUtils}} and {{org.apache.commons.codec.binary.Hex}}. This uses a direct look-up of the hex character using the index from successive 4 bits of a byte array to form an index from 0-15.
> Here's the function without details of how the {{byte[]}} is correctly sized:
> {code:java}
> private static final char[] DIGITS_LOWER = { 
>     '0', '1', '2', '3', '4', '5', '6', '7', '8', '9', 'a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f' };
> private static String nextHexString(UniformRandomProvider rng, byte[] bytes, int length) {
>     rng.nextBytes(bytes);
>     // Use the upper and lower 4 bits of each byte as an
>     // index in the range 0-15 for each hex character.
>     final char[] out = new char[length];
>     // Run the loop without checking index j by producing characters
>     // up to the size below the desired length.
>     final int loopLimit = length / 2;
>     int i = 0, j = 0;
>     while (i < loopLimit) {
>         final byte b = bytes[i];
>         // 0x0F == 0x01 | 0x02 | 0x04 | 0x08
>         out[j++] = DIGITS_LOWER[(b >>> 4) & 0x0F];
>         out[j++] = DIGITS_LOWER[b & 0x0F];
>         i++;
>     }
>     // The final character
>     if (j < length)
>         out[j++] = DIGITS_LOWER[(bytes[i] >>> 4) & 0x0F];
>     return new String(out);
> }
> {code}
> I've compared this to the original function and a modified one below that computes the exact same strings:
> {code:java}
> public String nextHexStringModified(UniformRandomProvider ran, int len) {
>     // Initialize output buffer
>     StringBuilder outBuffer = new StringBuilder();
>     // byte[] randomBytes = new byte[(len/2) + 1]; // ORIGINAL
>     byte[] randomBytes = new byte[(len + 1) / 2];
>     ran.nextBytes(randomBytes);
>     // Convert each byte to 2 hex digits
>     for (int i = 0; i < randomBytes.length; i++) {
>         // ORIGINAL
>         // Integer c = Integer.valueOf(randomBytes[i]);
>         // String hex = Integer.toHexString(c.intValue() + 128);
>         String hex = Integer.toHexString(randomBytes[i] & 0xff);
>         // Make sure we add 2 hex digits for each byte
>         if (hex.length() == 1) {
>             outBuffer.append('0');
>         }
>         outBuffer.append(hex);
>     }
>     return outBuffer.toString().substring(0, len);
> }
> {code}
> The timings are:
>  
> ||Name||Time||Relative||
> |StringSampler|316103|0.073|
> |nextHexStringModified|3708104|0.853|
> |nextHexStringOriginal|4348063|1.000|
> This is not using JMH but the results show the method performs better.
> The full {{StringSampler}} class supports a radix of 2, 8, and 16 for binary, octal and hex strings.
> JUnit tests show: the sampler computes the same values as {{nextHexStringModified(int);}} edges cases are handled with exceptions; and the output strings are uniform for each of the supported character sets (using a Chi Squared test).
> Can I create a PR for a {{org.apache.commons.rng.sampling.StringSampler}}?
>  



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