Am I missing something here? The point is to get a _truly_ random number,
right?
a) Why not use your processes PID?
b) Sound card input would also be excellent.
c) Time read straight from the clock chip helps, it's number of seconds
since Jan 1980, so it doesn't repeat, though it is predictable. Using
it as a seed would help though.
d) Mouse pointer coordinates would be excellent if they have a mouse
(WinNT or X).
e) Perhaps window position coordinates (WinNT or X)?
f) Perhaps just use the standard C runtime functions to get a random
number, and use that as a memory address to read into some kernel
tables (eg. process table) for a value. Obviously this would have to
be a kernel process to get at those tables (all OSes).
g) Ask the video card for scan position. As the program could ask at any
time, this would be very random (within a small range).
h) Ask the keyboard hardware for scan index. As g), this is random as
the software could ask at any time. (Is this info available?)
i) Ask the network driver for the number of bytes/packets sent. This
should be easily accessed, and will always be changing.
My point is that there are a whole bunch of ways to do this in software.
There are a bazillion different values in any given computer that are
changing over time in unrelated ways. They can be used in conjunction to
come up with a very random number.
> From: "Terrell Larson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Date: Sat, 16 Oct 99 20:46:56 -0600
> Subject: Re: RNGs - Use input from your sound card!
>
> commercial.
>
> On Sat, 16 Oct 1999 20:18:35 -0400, Michael R. Batchelor wrote:
>
> >>Would it make any sense to build a card?
> >
> >
> >As a commercial product or a hobby project?
> >
> >MB
> >
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