question: private static byte [ ] hash ( String text ) throws AWSIotException { try { MessageDigest md = MessageDigest . getInstance ( HASH_ALGORITHM ) ; md . update ( text . getBytes ( UTF8 ) ) ; return md . digest ( ) ; } catch ( Exception e ) { throw new AWSIotException ( "Unable to compute hash while signing request: " + e . getMessage ( ) ) ; } }
target:  Hashes the string contents (assumed to be UTF-8) using the SHA-256 algorithm.