True, that's the tech behind it.

Is there any reason most programmers should know any of this ?

The code should look more like this(and should use a standard library):

import Password_protector

P = Password_protector(date_of_first_use) #library upgrades algorithms every once in a while, only a single algorithm available per date. If there's a need for automatically upgraded hashing library should handle covertly.

protected_password = P.protect_password(password)

if P.compare_password(password, protected_password) == True ...

Or something similar. That at least should cover the basics - safely.