Yes, I'm guessing it's probably possible - as far as I know, MySql does support unique indexes on multiple columns - so all you really have to do is to create such an index, and then generate a random string and just attempt to insert. If success, great. If failed, generate a new string and repeat until success.
With 1.6M options, I don't think the Birthday problem is really a factor to consider here.
@peledzohar
good points, thanks for sharing. Instead of trying to reinsert on failure, I just thought of this to avoid collisions (even though the birthday problem isnt a pressing issue at the moment). Let me know what you think of this.
What if:
I dropped the idea of a unique userID+commentID, and ONLY made the commentID unique?
Instead of randomly generated commentID strings, what if I made the commentID the primary key, and incremented it sequentially, starting with 4 characters, and when we run out of 4 characters, move to 5 and then 6? Is there a downside to doing this? I dont think I necessarily need the commentIDs to be randomly generated since all comments are public so security isnt really a concern here.
Taking this page dev.to/peledzohar/comment/fmnb as an example, it would only load if I get both the userID "peledzohar" and commentID "fmnb" correct. Otherwise it would show a 404 page.
Thoughts on this approach? In this case, would commentID be a primary key? How would I get it to auto-increment and go from a default of 4 characters to 5, and so on? Am I still overcomplicating or over-thinking this?
Yes, I'm guessing it's probably possible - as far as I know, MySql does support unique indexes on multiple columns - so all you really have to do is to create such an index, and then generate a random string and just attempt to insert. If success, great. If failed, generate a new string and repeat until success.
With 1.6M options, I don't think the Birthday problem is really a factor to consider here.
@peledzohar good points, thanks for sharing. Instead of trying to reinsert on failure, I just thought of this to avoid collisions (even though the birthday problem isnt a pressing issue at the moment). Let me know what you think of this.
What if:
Thoughts on this approach? In this case, would commentID be a primary key? How would I get it to auto-increment and go from a default of 4 characters to 5, and so on? Am I still overcomplicating or over-thinking this?
Then why not simply use an integer?
Also a possibility