<p>Any program actually generating bitcoin addresses will always be hashing the bytes directly - what you see on the Wiki are simple hexadecimal strings representing those bytes.</p>

<p>The various hashing sites you have tried will treat those inputs as strings. For example, instead of hashing the byte <code>0xFF</code> when you enter <code>FF</code>, they will hash the text <code>FF</code>, which is actually two bytes if interpreted as ASCII. You will never get a correct answer using such sites.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-05-25T15:42:30.797Z
2019-05-25T15:42:30.797Z
Raghav Sood
<p>I’m learning how hashing algorithms are used around the process of bitcoin address creation.</p>

<p>I’ve read lots of great examples online that, step by step, show the output of each sequential hashing stage - start to finish.</p>

<p>I’ve occasionally copied one of the outputs from one of the steps (from the online 'worked example') using copy (<em>Ctrl C</em>) and then pasted it (<em>Ctrl V</em>) into one of the many online hashing sites to simply confirm the next step in the process to see it for myself.</p>

<p>I’m doing something wrong. Convinced that my simple ‘copy and paste’ approach must be flawed as my hashed output won’t ever match the hashed output shown on the example online -never does. </p>

<p>I’ve checked for the hard to see <em>white space</em> and <em>carriage returns</em> but to no avail.</p>

<p>Any comments greatly appreciated regarding what I might be doing wrong when I’m simply double checking each stage for myself ?</p>

<p>Here’s two sites I’ve studied:
<a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Technical_background_of_version_1_Bitcoin_addresses" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Technical_background_of_version_1_Bitcoin_addresses</a>
<a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Wallet_import_format" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Wallet_import_format</a></p>

<p>and two sites I’ve used for checking hashing:<br>
<a href="https://hash.online-convert.com/sha256-generator" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://hash.online-convert.com/sha256-generator</a><br>
<a href="https://md5calc.com/hash/ripemd160" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://md5calc.com/hash/ripemd160</a></p>

<address-generation><sha256><ripemd160>
Learning + checking the bitcoin address creation process at each step
CB1066
# Learning + checking the bitcoin address creation process at each step

(Asked by: username_0 on 2019-05-25)

I’m learning how hashing algorithms are used around the process of bitcoin address creation.

I’ve read lots of great examples online that, step by step, show the output of each sequential hashing stage - start to finish.

I’ve occasionally copied one of the outputs from one of the steps (from the online 'worked example') using copy (*Ctrl C*) and then pasted it (*Ctrl V*) into one of the many online hashing sites to simply confirm the next step in the process to see it for myself.

I’m doing something wrong. Convinced that my simple ‘copy and paste’ approach must be flawed as my hashed output won’t ever match the hashed output shown on the example online -never does.

I’ve checked for the hard to see *white space* and *carriage returns* but to no avail.

Any comments greatly appreciated regarding what I might be doing wrong when I’m simply double checking each stage for myself ?

Here’s two sites I’ve studied:
<https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Technical_background_of_version_1_Bitcoin_addresses>
<https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Wallet_import_format>

and two sites I’ve used for checking hashing:  
<https://hash.online-convert.com/sha256-generator>  
<https://md5calc.com/hash/ripemd160>

**Tags:** address-generation, sha256, ripemd160


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2019-05-25. Score: 0 | Accepted answer

Any program actually generating bitcoin addresses will always be hashing the bytes directly - what you see on the Wiki are simple hexadecimal strings representing those bytes.

The various hashing sites you have tried will treat those inputs as strings. For example, instead of hashing the byte `0xFF` when you enter `FF`, they will hash the text `FF`, which is actually two bytes if interpreted as ASCII. You will never get a correct answer using such sites.


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