Hashing

Objectives
2
• Why Hashing?
• Hash Table
• Hash Functions
• Collision Resolution
• Deletion
• Perfect Hash Functions
• Hash Functions for Extendable files
• Hash code
• Maps
• Hashing in java.util
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 Why hashing?
3
• If data collection is sorted array, we can search for an
item in O(log n) time using the binary search
algorithm.
• However with a sorted array, inserting and deleting
items are done in O(n) time.
• If data collection is balanced binary search tree, then
inserting, searching and deleting are done in O(log n)
time.
• Is there a data structure where inserting, deleting and
searching for items are more efficient?
• The answer is “Yes”, that is a Hash Table.

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 Hash Tables
 We’ll discuss the hash table ADT which supports only a
subset of the operations allowed by binary search trees.
 The implementation of hash tables is called hashing.
 Hashing is a technique used for performing insertions,
deletions and finds in constant average time (i.e. O(1))
 This data structure, however, is not efficient in operations
that require any ordering information among the elements,
such as findMin, findMax and printing the entire table in
sorted order.

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 General Idea
 The ideal hash table structure is merely an array of some
fixed size, containing the items.
 A stored item needs to have a data member, called key,
that will be used in computing the index value for the item.
– Key could be an integer, a string, etc
– e.g. a name or Id that is a part of a large employee structure
 The size of the array is TableSize.
 The items that are stored in the hash table are indexed by
values from 0 to TableSize – 1.
 Each key is mapped into some number in the range 0 to
TableSize – 1.
 The mapping is called a hash function.

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 Hash Table Example - 1 Hash
Table
0
1
Items
2
john 25000 john25000
25000
3 john
phil 31250 key Hash 4 phil31250
phil 31250
Function
dave 27500 5
6 dave27500
dave 27500
mary 28200
7 mary28200
mary 28200

key 8
9

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 Hash Function - 1
 The hash function:
– must be simple to compute.
– must distribute the keys evenly among the cells.
 If we know which keys will occur in
advance we can write perfect hash
functions, but in many cases we don’t.

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 Hash Function - 2
Problems:
 Keys may not be numeric.
 Number of possible keys is much larger than
the space available in table.
 Different keys may map into same location
– Hash function is not one-to-one => collision.
– If there are too many collisions, the performance of the
hash table will suffer dramatically.

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 Hash Function - 3
 If the input keys are integers then simply
Key mod TableSize is a general strategy.
– Unless key happens to have some undesirable
properties. (e.g. all keys end in 0 and we use mod
10)
 If the keys are strings, hash function
needs more care.
– First convert it into a numeric value.

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 Hash table example - 2
10

• We design a hash table

for a map storing
entries as (ID, Name),
where ID is a nine-digit
positive integer
• Our hash table uses an
array of size N = 10,000
and the hash function
h(x) = last four digits of
x

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 How to select Hash Functions?
• We want a hash function that is easy to compute
and that minimizes the number of collisions.
• Hashing functions should be unbiased.
– That is, if we randomly choose a key, x, from
the key space, the probability that f(x) = i is
1/M, where M is the size of the hash table.
– We call a hash function that satisfies unbiased
property a uniform hash function.

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 Division Hash Functions
• Division hD(x) = x % M :
– Using the modulus (%) operator.
– We divide the key x by some number M and use the remainder as the
hash index for x.
• This gives indexes that range from 0 to M - 1,
where M = that table size (hash table).
• The choice of M is critical.
– If M is divisible by 2, then odd keys to odd indexes and even keys to
even ones. (biased!!)
– If M is a power of 2, i.e. m = 2^p , then h(k) is just the p lowest-order bits
of k. (biased!!)
– If M = pH, then keys in the set {H, 2H, 3H, …, (p-1)H, pH, (p+1)H,…, kH,…}
map to p positions {H, 2H, 3H, …, (p-1)H, 0} only (biased!!)
– A good choice for M would be : M a prime number such that M does not
divide rka for small k and a.
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 Folding Hash Functions
• Folding
– Partition key x into several parts.
– All parts except for the last one have the same length.
– Add the parts together to obtain the value y, the hash index
then is h(x) = y % M.
• Two possibilities (divide x into several parts)
– Shift folding:
Shift all parts except for the last one, so that the least
significant bit of each part lines up with corresponding bit of
the last part. Suppose x = 72320354121324
• x1=723, x2=203, x3=541, x4=213, x5=24,
index= (x1 + x2 + x3 + x4 + x5) % 1000 = 1704%1000 = 704
– Boundary folding (folding at the boundaries):
reverses every other partition before adding
• x1=723, x2=302, x3=541, x4=312, x5=24, index=1902%1000 = 902
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 Other Hash Functions
14
• In the mid-square method, the key is squared and the middle
or mid part of the result is used as the address
Exp: key = 3121² = 9 740 641 ->index = 406 mod Tsize
Since the middle bits of the square usually depend upon all
the characters in a key, there is high probability that different
keys will produce different hash indexes.
• In the extraction method, only a part of the key is used to
compute the address
Exp: 123-45-6789->1234-5-6789 -> index = 1289 mod TSize
• Using the radix transformation, the key K is transformed into
another number base; K is expressed in a numerical system
using a different radix.
Exp: 34510 = 4239 -> index = 423 mod TSize
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 Collision
15

• Collisions occur when different elements are

mapped to the same cell

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 Collision Resolution
Open addressing method
16
In the open addressing method, when a key x collides with
another key, the collision is resolved by finding an available
table entry other than the position (address) to which the
colliding key is originally hashed. Thus, if the position k = h(x)
is used, then the following postions are tried:
k = hi(x) = h(x)+ p(i) mod M, i = 1, 2, ... (M = Tsize)

•The simplest method is linear probing, for which p(i) = i,

and for the ith probe, the position to be tried is (h(x) + i)
mod M, i = 1,2,…

•Quadratic: p(i) = i2 thus the position to be tried is (h(x) +

i2) mod M, i = 1,2,…
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 Search an item in hash tables
17
using linear Probing
• Consider a hash table A
that uses linear probing
• get(k)
– We start at cell h(k)
– We probe consecutive
locations until one of
the following occurs
– An item with key k is
found, or
– An empty cell is found,
or
– N cells have been
unsuccessfully probed

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 Factors affecting Search perfomance
18

• Quality of hash function

– how uniform?
– depends on actual data
• Collision resolution strategy used
• Load factor of the HashTable
– N/Tsize
– The lower the load factor the better the
search performance

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 Quadratic Probing example
19

if the position k = h(x) is used, then the following

postions are tried:
k = hi(x) = h(x)+ i2 mod M, i = 1, 2, ... (M = Tsize)
h(x) = x mod 10
Insert keys 89, 18, 49, 58, 69 in this order

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 Advantages and disadvantages of
20
quadratic probing
One problem with quadratic probing is that probe
sequences do not probe all locations in the table. For
example, if M=11, k = h(x) = x%11. Then for those
key x-s, where h(x) = 3 and collision occurs, only
positons 3, 4, 7, 1, 8, 6 are probed.
when M is prime, we can make the following
guarantee.
Theorem. If M is prime and the table is at least half
empty, then quadratic probing will always find an
empty location. Furthermore, no locations are
checked twice.
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 Collision Resolution
Chaining method
• Keys do not have to be
stored in the table itself. In
chaining, each position of the
table is associated with a
linked list or chain of
structures whose info fields
store keys or references to
keys.
• This method is called
separate chaining, and a
table of references (pointers)
is called a scatter table. In
this method, the table can
never overflow, because the In chaining, colliding keys are put on
linked list is extendible. the same linked list

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 Collision Resolution
Coalesced hashing or coalesced chaining method
22 • A version of chaining called coalesced
hashing (or coalesced chaining)
combines linear probing with chaining.
Each position pos in the table contains 2
fields: info and next. The next field
contains the index of the next key that is
hashed to pos. By this way, a sequential
search down the table can be avoided by
directly accessing the next element on
the linked list. Coalesced hashing
puts a colliding key
• An overflow area known as a cellar can in the last available
position of the table
be allocated to store keys for which
there is no room in the table
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 Coalesced hashing example

Coalesced hashing puts a colliding key

in the last available position of the table
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 Bucket Addressing
• To store colliding elements in the same position in the table can be achieved by
associating a bucket with each address.
• A bucket is a block of space large enough to store multiple items (a block consists of
slots, each slot contains one item).
• By using buckets, the problem of collisons is not totally avoided. By incorporating the
open addressing approach, the colliding item can be stored in the next bucket is it
has an available slot when using linear probing, or it can be stored in some other
bucket when, say, quadratic probing is used. The colliding items can also be stored in
an overflow area. In this case, each bucket includes a field that indicates whether the
search should be continued in this area or not.

Buckets of a hash table with size 11 with entries (1,D), (25,C), (3,F), (14,Z), (6,A), (39,C),
and (7,Q), using a modulo-division hash function.
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 Deletion
Consider
25 the table in
which the keys are
stored using linear
probing. Suppose we
delete A4 and then then
try to find B4. Because
when searching B we
hash it to position 4 and
see that this position is
empty and conclude
Linear search in the situation where both insertion
that B4 is not found and deletion of keys are permitted
(which is not true).
To avoid this situation, we mark the deleted positions only. When
inserting new element to this position, we update information for new
element. When there too many marked deleted elements in the table,
the table is refresh (d).
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 Perfect Hash Functions
26
• If hash function h transforms different keys
into different numbers, it is called a perfect
hash function.
• If a function requires only as many cells in the
table as the number of data so that no empty
cell remains after hashing is completed, it is
called a minimal perfect hash function
• Cichelli’s method is an algorithm to construct
a minimal perfect hash function
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 Hash Functions for Extendible Files
• There are two categories of hashing: Static hashing (the
27

hash table is fixed-sized), and Dynamic/Extendible

hashing.
• Dynamic/Extendible hashing: splits and coalesces
buckets appropriately with the database size.
– i.e. buckets are added and deleted on demand.
– The hash function typically produces a large number of hash
values, uniformly and randomly.
– Only part of the value k = h(x) is used depending on the size
of the database.
– Hash indices are typically a prefix of the entire hash value.
– More than one consecutive index can point to the same
bucket.
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 Cryptographic Hash Functions
A cryptographic hash function is a hash function which takes an input (or
28
message) and returns a fixed-size alphanumeric string, which is called
the hash value (sometimes called a message digest, a digital
fingerprint, a digest or a checksum).

The ideal hash function has three main properties:

1. It is extremely easy to calculate a hash for any given data.
2. It is extremely computationally difficult to calculate an alphanumeric text
that has a given hash.
3. It is extremely unlikely that two slightly different messages will have the
same hash.
4. Functions with these properties are used as hash functions for a variety
of purposes, not only in cryptography. Practical applications include
message integrity checks, digital signatures, authentication, and various
information security applications.

Common hash functions: MD5, SHA-1, SHA-2 , SHA-3

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 Hash Code
• If the input keys are integers then simply Key mod TableSize
29

is a general strategy.
– Unless key happens to have some undesirable properties.
(e.g. all keys end in 0 and we use mod 10)
• If the keys are not integers, hash function needs more care.
– The first action that a hash function performs is to
convert an arbitrary key k to an integer that is called the
hash code for k; this integer need not be in the range
[0,M −1], and may even be negative. For example, If the
keys are real numbers between 0 and 1, we might just
multiply by M and round off to the nearest integer to get
an index between 0 and M-1
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 Maps - 1
30 A map is an abstract data type designed to efficiently store and retrieve
values based upon a uniquely identifying search key for each.
Specifically, a map stores keyvalue pairs (k,v), which we call entries,
where k is the key and v is its corresponding value. Keys are required to
be unique, so that the association of keys to values defines a mapping.

The figure below provides a

conceptual illustration of a map
using the file-cabinet metaphor.
For a more modern metaphor,
think about the web as being a
map whose entries are the web
pages. The key of a page is its
URL (e.g.,
http://datastructures.net/) and its
value is the page content.
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 Maps - 2
• A map models a searchable collection of
key-value entries
• The main operations of a map are for
searching, inserting, and deleting items
• Multiple entries with the same key are not
allowed
• Applications:
– address book
– student-record database

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 Read the textbook at home
and do the Assignment #02

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