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Is the UUIDGenerator using the algoritm to generate IETF UUID version 4 (random) ? If so, can you add to documentation with reference to the IETF standard ? If it is version 4 (random), can you explain which library is used as seed for the random number?

Hi @tiemens_g,

The function the UUIDGenerator relies on respect OS api calls to generate UUIDs:

Dependent on your system you should be able to find out which algorithm these functions use.


Hi @tiemens_g,

it is my understanding that you can refer the version of a UUID from the typical 8-4-4-4-12 representation (AAAAAAAA-BBBB-CCCC-DDDD-FFFFFFFFFFFF) by

  1. Checking for current variant: Test if the first bit of the DDDD-part equals to 8, 9, A or B.
  2. Get the first bit of the CCCC-Part and treat it as version information. Hence, if this bit is 4, the generated UUID is version 4 (randomly generated).

Also, have a look at:

Based on that, it is my conclusion that UUIDGenerator simply returns randomly created UUIDs (version 4).

Having to work with UUID (in FME) myself I stumbled upon your question. It seems to me, that there was no answer regarding the version used of UUIDGenerator, yet. Unfortunately, the transfomer's documentation is very sparse....


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