security/nss/lib/freebl/mpi/doc/prng.pod@b8a032363ba2 (annotated)
security/nss/lib/freebl/mpi/doc/prng.pod
Thu, 22 Jan 2015 13:21:57 +0100
- author
- Michael Schloh von Bennewitz <michael@schloh.com>
- date
- Thu, 22 Jan 2015 13:21:57 +0100
- branch
- TOR_BUG_9701
- changeset 15
- b8a032363ba2
- permissions
- -rw-r--r--
Incorporate requested changes from Mozilla in review:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1123480#c6
| michael@0 | 1 | =head1 NAME |
| michael@0 | 2 | |
| michael@0 | 3 | prng - pseudo-random number generator |
| michael@0 | 4 | |
| michael@0 | 5 | =head1 SYNOPSIS |
| michael@0 | 6 | |
| michael@0 | 7 | prng [count] |
| michael@0 | 8 | |
| michael@0 | 9 | =head1 DESCRIPTION |
| michael@0 | 10 | |
| michael@0 | 11 | B<Prng> generates 32-bit pseudo-random integers using the |
| michael@0 | 12 | Blum-Blum-Shub (BBS) quadratic residue generator. It is seeded using |
| michael@0 | 13 | the standard C library's rand() function, which itself seeded from the |
| michael@0 | 14 | system clock and the process ID number. Thus, the values generated |
| michael@0 | 15 | are not particularly useful for cryptographic applications, but they |
| michael@0 | 16 | are in general much better than the typical output of the usual |
| michael@0 | 17 | multiplicative congruency generator used by most runtime libraries. |
| michael@0 | 18 | |
| michael@0 | 19 | You may optionally specify how many random values should be generated |
| michael@0 | 20 | by giving a I<count> argument on the command line. If you do not |
| michael@0 | 21 | specify a count, only one random value will be generated. The results |
| michael@0 | 22 | are output to the standard output in decimal notation, one value per |
| michael@0 | 23 | line. |
| michael@0 | 24 | |
| michael@0 | 25 | =head1 RESTRICTIONS |
| michael@0 | 26 | |
| michael@0 | 27 | As stated above, B<prng> uses the C library's rand() function to seed |
| michael@0 | 28 | the generator, so it is not terribly suitable for cryptographic |
| michael@0 | 29 | applications. Also note that each time you run the program, a new |
| michael@0 | 30 | seed is generated, so it is better to run it once with a I<count> |
| michael@0 | 31 | parameter than it is to run it multiple times to generate several |
| michael@0 | 32 | values. |
| michael@0 | 33 | |
| michael@0 | 34 | =head1 AUTHOR |
| michael@0 | 35 | |
| michael@0 | 36 | Michael J. Fromberger <sting@linguist.dartmouth.edu> |
| michael@0 | 37 | Copyright (C) 1998 Michael J. Fromberger, All Rights Reserved |
| michael@0 | 38 | Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH USA |
