question: protected static Long convertStringToBuckectingLong ( String stringToBeConverted ) { if ( stringToBeConverted == null || stringToBeConverted . equals ( "" ) ) { return null ; } byte [ ] byteString = stringToBeConverted . getBytes ( ) ; if ( byteString . length < 8 ) { byte [ ] newByteString = new byte [ 8 ] ; for ( int i = 0 ; i < newByteString . length ; i ++ ) { if ( i < byteString . length ) { newByteString [ i ] = byteString [ i ] ; } else { newByteString [ i ] = 0 ; } } byteString = newByteString ; } ByteBuffer bb = ByteBuffer . wrap ( byteString ) ; long byteMethod = bb . getLong ( ) ; byteMethod = Math . abs ( byteMethod ) ; return byteMethod ; }
target:  Converts a string into long values takes the first 8 bytes and uses those to convert them into long, if the string does not contain 8 bytes we pad them with zeros