Data-handling functions

Data-handling functions are vector functions that return a hash value based on an input column or columns.

In general, data-handling functions allow you to perform hashing operations on data. Hashing functions map large data sets with varying lengths to smaller data sets of static lengths. For example, you could hash a list of names of varying lengths (e.g., Chris, Jon, George, Darren, Curtis), to a list of corresponding numbers of fixed length (e.g., 1, 2, 3, 4, 5).