[ANN] Random 0.2.1

ruby-talk
1

Hi,

A first public release of Random is now available. See README below
for details and get it from:

http://rubyforge.org/projects/random/

It has only been tested on linux so far and is only available as a gem.

If someone is willing to compile it on windows and mac os x so we can
have pre-compiled gems please email me.

Best regards and happy easter,

Robert Feldt

= Random - Ruby classes for pseudorandom number generation

This package contains Random, a ruby extension adding classes for
generating pseudorandom number generation (PRNG).

Random has the following features:

* A fast PRNG implemented in C and wrapped in a Ruby class. The
algorithm is the well-known and widely used MersenneTwister.

* Multiple independent random streams can be active at the same time
(since the PRNG is wrapped in a class and objects of that class are
independent).

* PRNG objects supports marshaling.

This is in contrast to Ruby's standard srand/rand methods. Even though
the standard methods use the same PRNG algorithm (the MersenneTwister)
only a single (global) PRNG exists for each ruby invocation and its
state cannot be saved to disc. Random alleviates these problems. This
is especially important for scientific and simulation applications.

== Download

The latest version of Random can be found at

* http://rubyforge.org/projects/random/

== Installation

=== GEM Installation

Download and install Random with the following.

   gem install --remote random

=== Running the Random Test Suite

Random comes with an extensive test suite. If you wish to run it:

* CD into the top project directory of random.
* Type:

     rake # If you have a version of rake installed

== Online Resources and References

* Documentation Home: coming!
* Project Page: http://rubyforge.org/projects/random
* API Documents: coming!

== Simple Example

Once installed, you can use random as follows:

:include: doc/simple_example.rb

== Credits

[<b>Richard Wagner</b>] For the C++ implementation of the
MersenneTwister which is the basis for Random::MersenneTwister.

== License

Random is available under a BSD-style license.

:include: LICENSE

== Support

The Random homepage is http://random.rubyforge.org. You can find the Random
RubyForge page at http://rubyforge.org/projects/random.

Feel free to submit commits or feature requests. If you send a patch,
please also update and send the corresponding unit tests.

It would be great to get help with creating pre-compiled gems of this
to simplify for users that do not have a build environment. Please
email if you can help with this (especially for non-linux targets).

For other information, feel free to ask on the ruby-talk mailing list
(which is mirrored to comp.lang.ruby) or contact
mailto:robert.feldt@gmail.com.

···

---

= Other stuff

Author:: Robert Feldt <robert.feldt@gmail.com>
Requires:: Ruby 1.8.2 or later (but only tested with 1.8.4)
License:: Copyright 2006 by Robert Feldt
           Released under a BSD-style license. See the LICENSE file
           included in the distribution.

2

Once installed, you can use random as follows:

:include: doc/simple_example.rb

Oops, this should be:

  require 'rubygems'
  require 'random'

  mt = Random::RNG.new()
  mt.rand # like Ruby's normal rand
  mt.rand_num(1, 6) # gives a random integer in 1..6
  mt.rand_float_exclusive # gives random float >= 0.0 and < 1.0
  mt.rand_float # gives random float >= 0.0 and <= 1.0
  mt.rand_int_with_bits(1000) # gives random integer with 1000 random bits
  mt.rand_bytes(10) # gives a random string of length 10
  mt.next # next random number in RNG stream (typically an
                              # integer >= 0 and < 2**32)
  str = Marshal.dump(mt) # Marshal the full state of mt to a string
  mt2 = Marshal.load(str) # and read it back in.
  mt2.next == mt.next # => true
  a = (1..100).to_a
  a.random_element # gives a random element from the array