From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: "Stephen J. Turnbull" Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: random doesn't feel very random Date: Sat, 25 Aug 2012 02:45:00 +0900 Message-ID: <87fw7cuqub.fsf@uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> References: <876288yh72.fsf@kanis.fr> <87ipc8vkj6.fsf@uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> <50374504.4050807@cs.ucla.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1345830311 13337 80.91.229.3 (24 Aug 2012 17:45:11 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2012 17:45:11 +0000 (UTC) Cc: Ivan Kanis , emacs devel To: Paul Eggert Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Aug 24 19:45:11 2012 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1T4xwU-0007GC-30 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 19:45:10 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:34550 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T4xwS-0001sz-BY for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 13:45:08 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([208.118.235.92]:50030) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T4xwP-0001rk-9G for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 13:45:06 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T4xwO-0008Nm-0f for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 13:45:05 -0400 Original-Received: from mgmt2.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp ([130.158.97.224]:39482) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T4xwN-0008IQ-Mp for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 13:45:03 -0400 Original-Received: from uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp [130.158.99.156]) by mgmt2.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (Postfix) with ESMTP id 10C5E970888; Sat, 25 Aug 2012 02:45:01 +0900 (JST) Original-Received: by uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (Postfix, from userid 1000) id C9E8612081B; Sat, 25 Aug 2012 02:45:00 +0900 (JST) In-Reply-To: <50374504.4050807@cs.ucla.edu> X-Mailer: VM 8.0.12-devo-585 under 21.5 (beta32) "habanero" b0d40183ac79 XEmacs Lucid (x86_64-unknown-linux) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 3) X-Received-From: 130.158.97.224 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:152814 Archived-At: Paul Eggert writes: > On 08/24/2012 12:03 AM, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote: > > That doesn't mean there are no such experts among Emacs developers, > > it just means I haven't seen anybody display appropriate credentials > > on emacs-devel. > > I'm not sure what you mean by "credentials". That doesn't really matter. The point is what the credentials are for. I wrote: Even using /dev/urandom to generate the seed would be overkill in almost all applications, and I wouldn't trust anybody in Emacs to write code for an application that needs that level of randomness. You see, I'm not talking about credentials for *implementing* a (P)RNG, I'm talking about *using* it. I'm saying that if you *need* a (P)RNG of that quality, nobody I know could write the rest of the application in Emacs Lisp and be sure it's as good as the (P)RNG is. That doesn't mean there's anything *wrong* with implementing a better PRNG for Lisp. But I personally wouldn't bother. random(3) is plenty good enough for me.