RFE: please add "hash-type" prefix to *sum utilities

[Dmitry Yu. Bolkhovityanov]

	All of /usr/bin/*sum utilities produce very similar output 
consisting of a long number of hex-digits, so that later one can't 
instantly understand what type of hash it is.

	It was acceptable in the old md5sum-only days, but now it causes 
much confusion. For example, see RedHat bug #515715.

	Of course, one can count the number of digits, but a) that's 
weird; b) different algorythms can use equal hash length.

	The problem would be eliminated if *sum utils could prefix hashes 
with "type-tag", similarly to what is done in /etc/shadow.  For example, 
"sha1:..." or "sha1/...".
(And that is THE RIGHT THING -- data of unknown type is bad, so http 
introduced "Content-type:" header, PGP includes "Hash:" prefix, etc.  With 
current diversity of hash types, that becomes the barest necessity for 
*sum utils too...)

(Of curse, for compatibility reasons, that have to be switched on 
explicitly -- e.g., with "-l" (Label). And besides adding such tags, *sum 
have to understand such prefixes, but that's trivial.)

        _________________________________________
          Dmitry Yu. Bolkhovityanov
          The Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics
          Novosibirsk, Russia