There's a new getrandom call in the kernel since 3.19. When I look in the /usr/include/linux/random.h, it is there, but commented out. Since this call uses /dev/urandom or /dev/random, it is far better than the rand () and random () calls, which are linear congruential and repeat after only 2**31 calls. The PRNG in the kernel is a modified mersenne twister, and the repeat is, from memory, ~2**1700. Not to mention that it is modified, and so is better.
Here's a link to an online man page. http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/getrandom.2.html
Was there a security issue? Or is it just not ready for prime time?
On Sat, Jul 25, 2015 at 10:18 AM, stan stanl-fedorauser@vfemail.net wrote:
There's a new getrandom call in the kernel since 3.19. When I look in the /usr/include/linux/random.h, it is there, but commented out. Since this call uses /dev/urandom or /dev/random, it is far better than the rand () and random () calls, which are linear congruential and repeat after only 2**31 calls. The PRNG in the kernel is a modified mersenne twister, and the repeat is, from memory, ~2**1700. Not to mention that it is modified, and so is better.
Here's a link to an online man page. http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/getrandom.2.html
Was there a security issue? Or is it just not ready for prime time?
I don't know, but if there's no answer by Tuesday consider posting the inquiry to the (Fedora) kernel list.
-
Chris Murphy -
stan