srand

NAME

srand - seed the random number generator

SYNOPSIS

srand EXPR

DESCRIPTION

Sets the random number seed for the rand operator. If EXPR is omitted, does srand(time) . Many folks use an explicit srand(time ^ $$) instead. Of course, you'd need something much more random than that for cryptographic purposes, since it's easy to guess the current time. Checksumming the compressed output of rapidly changing operating system status programs is the usual method. Examples are posted regularly to the comp.security.unix newsgroup.