What does "hashing files" mean?

[aznmist]

What does "hashing files" mean?

 

[XeonTux]

Basically indexing them

 

[MulLa]

Isn't that some sort of security related thing? Got something to do with your password...

 

[aznmist]

I think XeonTux is right..thanks to both

 

[bluemax]

XeonTux is right. I've had to do it in programming classes... it's just plain nasty. Ugh. :disgust:

 

[zippy]

It means you take the files...put them in some paper...roll them...then...oh, hashing files- my bad.

Just kidding.

 

[Noriaki]

There are two commons meanings for the word hash.

One is a type of index structure to records in the file.

The other involves taking a few numbers and encoding them together.
Like Windows XP hases a PID against Serial numbers of certain pieces of hardware to generate your auth code.

The two meanings are actually related...but I won't get into that...

Hashing a file refers to the first usage, and is what XeonTux said.