MD5Tools.java

/*
 * MD5Tools.java
 * Copyright (C) 2006 Nicholas Killewald
 *
 * This file is distributed under the terms of the BSD license.
 * See the LICENSE file under the toplevel images/ directory for terms.
 */

package net.exclaimindustries.tools;

import java.security.MessageDigest;
import java.security.NoSuchAlgorithmException;

/**
 * <code>MD5Tools</code> consists of a helper method for the common gruntwork
 * tasks commonly associated with MD5 hashing. Most common of these would be the
 * hashing of a simple string.
 * 
 * @author Nicholas Killewald
 */
public class MD5Tools {

    /**
     * Hashes a string through the MD5 algorithm. If something goes wrong with
     * getting an MD5 instance, this returns an empty string.
     * 
     * @param input
     *            String object to hash
     * @return the MD5 hash of the input
     */
    public static String MD5hash(String input) {
        MessageDigest diggy;

        try {
            diggy = MessageDigest.getInstance("MD5");
        } catch (NoSuchAlgorithmException e) {
            // No, seriously, if this fails, we're all doomed.
            return "";
        }

        diggy.update(CharToByte.charsToBytes(input.toCharArray()));

        return CharToByte.bytesToString(diggy.digest());
    }

}