From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me
X-Spam-Level: 
X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham
	autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4
X-Google-Thread: 103376,6609c40f81b32989
X-Google-NewGroupId: yes
X-Google-Thread: 1094ba,9bdec20bcc7f3687
X-Google-NewGroupId: yes
X-Google-Thread: 101deb,e67cdb1dcad3c668
X-Google-NewGroupId: yes
X-Google-Attributes: 
 gida07f3367d7,gid8d3408f8c3,gidbda4de328f,domainid0,public,usenet
X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit
Path: 
 g2news2.google.com!news1.google.com!Xl.tags.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.supernews.com!news.supernews.com.POSTED!not-for-mail
NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2010 19:18:23 -0500
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 2010 19:18:23 -0500
From: "Gary L. Scott" <garylscott@sbcglobal.net>
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.1; en-US;
 rv:1.9.1.9) Gecko/20100317 Thunderbird/3.0.4
MIME-Version: 1.0
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.fortran,comp.lang.pl1
Subject: Re: Why is Ada considered  "too specialized" for scientific use
References: <hp95j8$i29$1@speranza.aioe.org>
       <4bb9c72c$0$6990$9b4e6d93@newsspool4.arcor-online.net>
       <pan.2010.04.05.20.51.46.20000@none.net>
       <4bba8bf1$0$56418$c30e37c6@exi-reader.telstra.net>
       <4bbb2246$8$fuzhry+tra$mr2ice@news.patriot.net>
       <4bbb5386$0$56422$c30e37c6@exi-reader.telstra.net>
       <m2tyrnjc5f.fsf@pushface.org>
       <4bbdf5c6$1$fuzhry+tra$mr2ice@news.patriot.net>
       <4bc5a413$0$78577$c30e37c6@exi-reader.telstra.net>
 <4bc6e42f$2$fuzhry+tra$mr2ice@news.patriot.net>
 <4bd19a2b$0$895$c30e37c6@exi-reader.telstra.net>
 <hqshuh12ttj@news4.newsguy.com> <hqt4pt$odu$1@news.eternal-september.org>
 <4bd22c67$0$14121$703f8584@textnews.kpn.nl>
In-Reply-To: <4bd22c67$0$14121$703f8584@textnews.kpn.nl>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Message-ID: <boudnev5b_lSpU_WnZ2dnUVZ_oednZ2d@supernews.com>
X-Trace: 
 sv3-nqPhJQsXqtof+WCMnJrm7hxHwzwp2tu4wiEX2X3n7WK5jRUchPvWqCKXBdoQ/Z8eJhDNkBIf6UwRkZ7!fEBwDvjT7vMPmBOCx6pS0sR1cw1JZ0QK72VcRmlyIoTSp8gDtcXHS4jBSaj6xEmZhnE0e/R4qEse!RTduon/Z
X-Complaints-To: www.supernews.com/docs/abuse.html
X-DMCA-Complaints-To: www.supernews.com/docs/dmca.html
X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers
X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint
 properly
X-Postfilter: 1.3.40
Xref: g2news2.google.com comp.lang.ada:11151 comp.lang.fortran:24972
 comp.lang.pl1:1286
Date: 2010-04-23T19:18:23-05:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

On 4/23/2010 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.
Excellent time to trim nonessential newsgroups