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Subject: Re: Squashing Hash Table Bugs

Author: James Swafford

Date: 09:50:57 05/29/04

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On May 29, 2004 at 12:50:12, Bas Hamstra wrote:

>
>
>On May 29, 2004 at 11:10:47, James Swafford wrote:
>
>>In a recent post, Tord suggested setting a flag in
>>the search when the hash table suggests a fail high, and
>>testing whether the search would indeed fail high.
>>
>>The idea seems so simple I'm embarassed I haven't thought
>>of it before. :)
>>
>>I've been 'pretty sure' for a long time that I've got some
>>nasty hash bugs.  I'm in the mood to exterminate them.
>>
>>Last night I implemented Tord's idea and, to my dismay
>>(but not to my surprise) my hash table is saying 'fail
>>high' when the search wouldn't have failed high.  And-
>>it doesn't take very long. :)
>>
>>This seems like a nasty thing to debug.  I'm comtemplating
>>how I might go about it.  I'm hoping some of you can
>>provide some suggestions...
>>
>>--
>>James
>
>What you describe is not a good way of finding HT bugs, IMO. To start with, hash
>can cause inconsistent search results, even with completely bugfree code. Want
>to track hash bugs? Do this: write code to completely recalculate hashkey from
>scratch. Compare this key with the incremental key at every node. Analyze and
>fix differences until they are all gone.

I already do this... my keys are fine.


>
>
>Bas.



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