Six Characters

Article

• Deep dive into airline booking system record locators: exactly 6 base-36 characters
• Explains GDS constraints, IATA codes, and why the space is intentionally small
• Part of an Iron Core series on aviation industry infrastructure

Discussion

• Six base-36 chars is only 2B possibilities; large GDS could exhaust the space in a year
• Commenters note codes aren’t unique across time, creating long-term collision risk
• Readers find the constraint space ‘profoundly distressing’ given airline volume

Discuss on HN