I'm very sorry. I just realized why numbers 1-9 were favorites. When I grep for "1" all numbers including the number 1 will match.
robert On Sunday August 24 2008 06:48:57 pm Robert Connolly wrote: > Hi. I heard rumors about lotto statistics before, so I decided to check it > out. I'm using Canadian lotto, but this works with any. > > I got a copy of all past 649 lotto numbers from www.wclc.com. It's a pdf, > and I converted it to text, cut out the actual lotto numbers, and made a > list. Then I made statistics for how often each number comes out, and I was > blown away to find that the numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4 have come out over 5000 > times each, while the numbers 10-49 come out 300-400 times each. All the > numbers below 10 are favorites. I'm not sure, but the only thing that makes > sense to me is that the weight and aerodynamics of the paint cause single > digit balls to float better during the draw. I would be interested to know > if this is true with other lotto games (even bingo). > > I have my notes here: > http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/~robert/lotto-649/readme.txt > > With this, it's highly recommended to pick one or two numbers below 10, > when choosing lotto numbers. All the numbers above 10 are drawn almost > equally. > > I've tried to create a random number generator, but the ones I write end up > biased to low numbers and I don't understand why. > > This: > for ((i=1;i<=99999;i+=1)); do > echo $(($(echo $(head -n100 /dev/urandom | od -N 30) | > cut -d ' ' -f2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 | \ > sed 's/ //g') % 49 +1)) | sed -e 's/-//' -e '/^0/d' >> rng-results.txt > done > > and: > for ((i=1;i<=99999;i+=1)); do > echo $(($(./arc4random) % 49 + 1)) >> rng-results.txt > done > > both create results that progressively favor low numbers (in a non-random > way). Do any of you know why, or can suggest another method that will > generate numbers between 1 and 49 that will be mathematically equal? > Despite being random each of the 49 numbers should come out roughly equal > amount of times. > > The ideal script would choose one or two (randomly decided) numbers between > 1 and 10, because they are statistical favorites, then choose the remaining > numbers between 10 and 49, then choose a bonus number between 1 and 49. > Then check these results against old draws, to make sure they haven't been > drawn before (even a 4 out of 6 match with old draws would statistically > lower the chances of it being drawn again in the future). > > The chances of winning any prize is 1 in 32. Using this method may tip it > to 1 in 30, so why not... it can't hurt. > > I used to let the lotto machine pick my numbers, but after seeing the huge > favoritism to 1-10 numbers I'm going to start picking my own numbers. > > robert
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