From owner-freebsd-hackers Mon Oct 7 12:35:19 1996 Return-Path: owner-hackers Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) id MAA20957 for hackers-outgoing; Mon, 7 Oct 1996 12:35:19 -0700 (PDT) Received: from sovcom.kiae.su (sovcom.kiae.su [193.125.152.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id MAA20936; Mon, 7 Oct 1996 12:35:13 -0700 (PDT) Received: by sovcom.kiae.su id AA18748 (5.65.kiae-1 ); Mon, 7 Oct 1996 22:27:26 +0300 Received: by sovcom.KIAE.su (UUMAIL/2.0); Mon, 7 Oct 96 22:27:26 +0300 Received: (from ache@localhost) by nagual.ru (8.7.6/8.7.3) id XAA04826; Mon, 7 Oct 1996 23:26:04 +0400 (MSD) Message-Id: <199610071926.XAA04826@nagual.ru> Subject: Re: I plan to change random() for -current (was Re: rand() and random()) In-Reply-To: <199610071810.LAA14432@phaeton.artisoft.com> from "Terry Lambert" at "Oct 7, 96 11:10:44 am" To: terry@lambert.org (Terry Lambert) Date: Mon, 7 Oct 1996 23:26:04 +0400 (MSD) Cc: terry@lambert.org, joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de, freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org, current@FreeBSD.org, bde@zeta.org.au From: "=?KOI8-R?Q?=E1=CE=C4=D2=C5=CA_=FE=C5=D2=CE=CF=D7?=" (Andrey A. Chernov) Organization: self X-Class: Fast X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-hackers@FreeBSD.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Unless you are a mathematical programmer, you are unlikely to be > able to aprehend the consequences of even a trivial change away from > mathematical standards will have. There are verifiable standards > of correctness, and each standard dictates issues of precision to > which one can trust the code. Obviously, differences after the > significant digits can be ignored for comparison -- and are, in fact, > stripped from results as the "noise" that they are. FYI, I am applied mathematic, B.S. degree. > I suggest strict adherence to standards -- mathematical standards, > not ANSI or ISO C standards -- with regard to maintaining precision > and historical implementation, as required to ensure repeatability > and trust. Current random() code is joke from mathematical point of view (but not from ANSI/ISO standards). It is why it needs fixing. -- Andrey A. Chernov http://www.nagual.ru/~ache/