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Generate Random characters

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Topic

pvccaz
Yak Posting Veteran

87 Posts

Posted - 2013-08-20 : 20:34:33

Hi,

I need to generate random strings each of length 7 characters and update it in a table that contains employee data.

For example. There is table called as Employee. It has Id, FirstName, LastName & Email as the columns. I need to mask the real names. So i have to generate random characters between a-z unique for individual records and update it in the table.

Input table

ID FirstName LastName Email
1 Glen Jackson test1@email.com
2 Christopher McClain test2@email.com
3 Carol Kholer test4@email.com
4 James Desoto test5@email.com

Output table should be:

ID FirstName LastName Email
1 Khjkltg Erstlkj test1@email.com
2 Asdlkfu Alsdkjf test2@email.com
3 Alsdkfl Aldkjfl test4@email.com
4 Basdfwe Asldkfj test5@email.com

I went through some websites for generating random characters. These provide a 7 or 8 character random letters.
http://www.sqlteam.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=71874

But i do need to update 2 columns of an entire table with random characters.
Is there a good method to perform this. ?

Thanks in advance for your input.

James K
Master Smack Fu Yak Hacker

3873 Posts

Posted - 2013-08-20 : 20:54:01

Use a random number generator - here is one way. Perhaps there are ways to shorten this, but it should work:

UPDATE YourTable SET
	FirstName = 
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25) +
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25),
	LastName = 
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)+
	CHAR(65+ABS(CHECKSUM(NewId())) % 25)

Lamprey
Master Smack Fu Yak Hacker

4614 Posts

Posted - 2013-08-21 : 10:53:28

Dunno if this helps, but I tend to keep it simple and just use part of a GUID:

SELECT LEFT(REPLACE(CAST(NEWID() AS VARCHAR(36)), '-', ''), 7)

If you want to get fancy you can mae a table of names (first and last) and then cross join them to get a set of random names.
http://www.fakenamegenerator.com/order.php
http://listofrandomnames.com/
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/

pvccaz
Yak Posting Veteran

87 Posts

Posted - 2013-08-21 : 13:03:20

Thank you James and Lamprey. The samples that both of you provided works great !.

madhivanan
Premature Yak Congratulator

22864 Posts

Posted - 2013-08-26 : 06:45:19

This can also be of some help http://beyondrelational.com/modules/2/blogs/70/posts/10831/populating-sample-data.aspx

Madhivanan

Failing to plan is Planning to fail

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