jhermsmeier / node-scuid

A slim, fast alternative to cuid collision-resistant IDs

scuid

Collision-resistant IDs optimized for horizontal scaling and performance.

A slim, alternative, and compatible implementation of cuid for node, also featuring a wide range of options, as well as custom random number generator support. It can serve as a drop-in replacement, and is also faster than cuid.

Install via npm

$ npm install --save scuid

Usage

var scuid = require( 'scuid' )

Generate an ID

var id = scuid()
> 'ciux3hs0x0000io10cusdm8r2'

Generate a slug

var slug = scuid.slug()
> '6x1i0r0'

Get the process' fingerprint

var fingerprint = scuid.fingerprint()
> 'io10'

Use a custom (P)RNG

// Create a random number generator;
// It has to have a method called `random`
var generator = {
  random: function() {
    return 5 // chosen by fair dice roll
  }
}

// Create a custom scuid instance
var scuid = require( 'scuid' ).create({
  rng: generator
})

Use other custom options

Note that fiddeling with these might make your IDs incompatible with cuid's guarantees.

var scuid = require( 'scuid' ).create({
  prefix: 'c', // the ID's prefix
  base: 36, // radix used in .toString() calls (2-36)
  blockSize: 4, // block size to pad and trim to
  fill: '0', // block padding character
  pid: process.pid, // process ID
  fingerprint: scuid.createFingerprint( [pid], [hostname] ), // Machine fingerprint
  rng: Math, // Random number generator
})

Tests

Just like cuid, collision resistance for both – slugs and IDs – is tested over 1 million and 2 million iterations respectively. To run the tests, run:

$ npm test

Benchmarks

$ npm run compare

NANOBENCH version 2               |    NANOBENCH version 2
> nanobench benchmark/index.js    |    > nanobench benchmark/cuid.js
                                  |
# id ⨉ 1000000                   <<<   # id ⨉ 1000000
ok ~1 s (1 s + 439835 ns)        <<<   ok ~4.74 s (4 s + 737960551 ns)
                                  |
# slug ⨉ 1000000                 <<<   # slug ⨉ 1000000
ok ~859 ms (0 s + 858990359 ns)  <<<   ok ~2.67 s (2 s + 665230762 ns)
                                  |
# fingerprint ⨉ 1000000          >>>   # fingerprint ⨉ 1000000
ok ~1.87 ms (0 s + 1870116 ns)   >>>   ok ~1.57 ms (0 s + 1571116 ns)
                                  |
all benchmarks completed         <<<   all benchmarks completed
ok ~1.86 s (1 s + 861300310 ns)  <<<   ok ~7.4 s (7 s + 404762429 ns)

node-scuid's Issues

Cuid has been deprecated because it (and all other non-crypto k-sortable ids) is insecure.

Please upgrade to Cuid2.

Cuid has been deprecated due to security concerns. Likewise, UUID V4 may be insecure due to its reliance on the web crypto APIs, whose random number generators have historically gone years with known bugs that break cryptographic security (details in the Cuid2 documentation). All other UUIDs leak information which may be exploited.

Other ids that share these security concerns include Ulid, Snowflake, ShardingId, pushId, ObjectId, and KSUID. NanoId shares the same dependence on the web crypto API as UUID V4.