Random but unique

[Jim Hurley]

Sarah wrote:
It seems to me that everyone is being too complicated. What about:

sort lines of vChooseFrom by random(10000)  -- or some suitably big
number
return line 1 to vNumToChoose of vChooseFrom

I see how this works, and it is deliciously simple, but I don't see why. According to the documentation:

"The shortKey is a chunk expression that specifies which part of each line is used as the sort key. "

How does random(10000) specify "which part of each line is used" and why does that give the desired result? I am mystified.

When the compiler see "random(....)" does it bypass the "which part of each line is used" and just use the random() as seed in a random number generator to randomize the lines? Puzzling!

Jim Hurley
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