Forums Scripts & Popups $rand

One of the scripts I use extensively uses $rand. However, it's performance leads me to believe it isn't as random as I thought at first, there definately appears to be some form of pattern in the output. That reminds me of back when I played with C++, I once read that the randomize function in C/C++ actually uses the computer's clock in some way ti seed the function. I also remember there was a way to go around it so you get a real random number. Anyone have any hints on how to make $rand pick a real random number?

I've heard of this problem too..I think someone said once that mIRC uses $ticks to get the random number..but then in one of the new versions of mIRC recently I think $rand was improved upon..

But I'm not sure. Ironically, I don't know how to do what you're wanting, I just thought I'd throw in my 2 cents.

c++ uses ctime as a seed for the random... which is utter crappy for randoms :-]

if you do several randoms within one second you get the same random integer... :-[ (had to test this for school...)

Which is what I concluded. Good thing to know I'm not completely losing it. So then we return to the original question: How do I get a truly random number.

you can't?

or you could seed the rand algortihm with a random number?

I know that you can't self seed in mIRC - but maybe a random loop ( e.g. loop for $rand(1, 100) times) would stop on a random 'tick' which makes it less predictable.

Cheers,
DK

Ah yes, here we are... I was sure that this had come up on the boards before.

This post makes the point that random numbers are only pseudo-random.

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