From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Richard Stallman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: random doesn't feel very random Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:48:10 -0400 Message-ID: References: <876288yh72.fsf@kanis.fr> Reply-To: rms@gnu.org NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-15 X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1345848507 26816 80.91.229.3 (24 Aug 2012 22:48:27 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2012 22:48:27 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Leo Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sat Aug 25 00:48:26 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 1T52fx-0004P4-Pe for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 25 Aug 2012 00:48:25 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:45188 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T52fw-0007GW-5P for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:48:24 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([208.118.235.92]:49252) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T52ft-0007GR-VR for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:48:22 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T52fj-000234-31 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:48:21 -0400 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([208.118.235.10]:33108) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T52fi-00022y-W6 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:48:11 -0400 Original-Received: from rms by fencepost.gnu.org with local (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1T52fi-0003JU-HH; Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:48:10 -0400 In-reply-to: (message from Leo on Fri, 24 Aug 2012 14:30:53 +0800) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 3) X-Received-From: 208.118.235.10 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:152820 Archived-At: That is probably because we have only one global random state and many packages reset it from time to time (see message-unique-id). Why would extra invocations of (random t) cause repetitive behavior? Ideally we should call (random t) only once or allow multiple random states. Supporting multiple random seeds would be a natural thing to do if there is some advantage in sticking with one random seed for a particular purpose, or if there is some harm in doing (random t) extra times. But what reason could there be for that? Except studying the pseudorandom number generator, that is. -- Dr Richard Stallman President, Free Software Foundation 51 Franklin St Boston MA 02110 USA www.fsf.org www.gnu.org Skype: No way! That's nonfree (freedom-denying) software. Use Ekiga or an ordinary phone call