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JavaScript JavaScript Basics (Retired) Working With Numbers Create a random number

How does RNG work?

I'm still trying to understand how RNG works. Do web browsers use seeds (if I'm using that term correctly) for RNG? Do all web browsers use the same seed? If you flip a coin (digitally speaking), you would normally have a 50-50 chance of it being heads or tails. Is it possible to write a statement that forces those chances to skew one way or the other, i.e., 60-40 or 25-75, if certain conditions are met?

1 Answer

RNG's and psuedo-RNG's (PRNG) are different things

On most modern computer systems you actually have access to a hardware register that provides a true RNG it's typically based on inherent noise found in a silicon circuit, amplified a lot, and used to drive something like a counter or shifter to collect many bits

PSRNG, are based mathematical operation starting with a seed which can be a unit of time from a clock, or something you enter, or even by accessing your RNG register

usually RNG/PSRNG's return a number with 16, 32, or 64 bits

of course you can write a skewed generator that's conditional

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