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From: Dick Hendrickson <dick.hendrickson@att.net>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.fortran,comp.lang.pl1
Subject: Re: Why is Ada considered  "too specialized" for scientific use
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2010 19:23:54 -0500
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Date: 2010-04-23T19:23:54-05:00
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On 4/23/10 6:25 PM, Sjouke Burry wrote:
> Peter Flass wrote:
>> J. Clarke wrote:
>>>> 4. Random number generation.
>>> How were random numbers generated before computers? Did they not have
>>> viable algorithms for the purpose?
>>
>> I think the "Chem Rubber Bible" has a table of random numbers you can
>> use; just pick a spot to start. OTOH, that begs the question of how
>> they were generated in the first place. I have visions of a roomful of
>> people flipping coins.
>
> Just take any bad quality resistor, zenerdiode, or a number
> of other electronic components, amplify the noise, and use it
> with a bit of hardware to produce an endless stream of random numbers.
> No computers needed.
You don't even need to find a "bad quality" one.  Shot noise is a result 
of the finiteness of the charge on an electron, not the electrons quality.

Dick Hendrickson