Question

I need PHP function that will create 8 chars long [a-z] hash from any input string.
So e.g. when I’ll submit “Stack Overflow” it will return e.g. “gdqreaxc” (8 chars [a-z] no numbers allowed)

Answer 1

Perhaps something like:

$hash = substr(strtolower(preg_replace('/[0-9_\/]+/','',base64_encode(sha1($input)))),0,8);

This produces a SHA1 hash, base-64 encodes it (giving us the full alphabet), removes non-alpha chars, lowercases it, and truncates it.

For $input = 'yar!';:

mwinzewn

For $input = 'yar!!';:

yzzhzwjj

So the spread seems pretty good.