Messages in this thread | | | Date | Thu, 3 Jun 1999 06:48:07 -0700 (PDT) | From | Tim Smith <> | Subject | Re: How can Emacs get a unique ID per Linux reboot? |
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On Tue, 1 Jun 1999, G. Allen Morris III wrote: > How about generating a 32bit random number at boot time. There > is a 1 in 2**32 of getting the same number after a reboot, but > that should not be a large problem.
That 1 in 2**32 is the chance of duplicating any specific number in the sequence. The chances of *some* member of the sequence being a duplicate is much higher. This is called the "birthday paradox" because if you pick ~30 people at random, it is highly likely that two of them will have the same birthday.
--Tim Smith
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