HI Randal, I drafted two replies to this and didn't feel comfortable enough with either of them to post.
I suspect you are right in what you say. I am doing some experiments to find out. So what do you suggest to solve the problem? More to my interest, what do you suggest as a test to prove the problem is solved to your satisfaction. What is a good or at least reasonable way to test the randomness of larger positive integers? I want to emphasize that my coding is just for m (Learning from my own mistakes is the only sure way to get past my stubborn part.) Basicly, I believe you might be right an the PRNG stuff. --- On Tue, 8/5/08, Randal L. Schwartz <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > From: Randal L. Schwartz <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: Re: [Newbies] Re: Tim's Fix for LargeIntger>>AtRandom > To: "Jerome Peace" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Cc: [email protected] > Date: Tuesday, August 5, 2008, 6:18 PM > >>>>> "Jerome" == Jerome Peace > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > Jerome> The objection Randal raised is that now it is > using too many. > Jerome> That's IMO a red herring. > > No, it's not. Multiple calls to a PRNG generate > correlated numbers, > which can be used for an attack. > > You need to use a PRNG that in a single call gives enough > bits. And > if you don't know that about PRNGs, you're not the > one to be fixing this. > I have not set out to. Tim should be able to succeed. My purpose is to encourage him to contribute. I am interested in writing tests that can show whether a particular solution is working sufficiently or not. > I talked about it in terms of entropy because that's > the easiest way to see > that you're not gaining anything except the illusion of > gain, which will bite > back some day. You can't get 112 bits of entropy by > calling a 56-bit PRNG > twice. > > It's not progress if it breaks it. It was for the Gossamer Condor. More to the issue. Help design a test to prove if its broken or not. > With respect, Yours in curiosity and service, --Jerome Peace _______________________________________________ Beginners mailing list [email protected] http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/beginners
