1.\" Copyright (c) 1994 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.\" @(#)random.6 8.2 (Berkeley) 3/31/94 29.\" $FreeBSD: src/games/random/random.6,v 1.8 2005/01/18 08:57:18 ru Exp $ 30.\" $DragonFly: src/games/random/random.6,v 1.3 2005/03/02 06:59:23 cpressey Exp $ 31.\" 32.Dd February 8, 2003 33.Dt RANDOM 6 34.Os 35.Sh NAME 36.Nm random 37.Nd random lines from a file or random numbers 38.Sh SYNOPSIS 39.Nm 40.Op Fl elrUuw 41.Op Fl f Ar filename 42.Op Ar denominator 43.Sh DESCRIPTION 44.Nm Random 45has two distinct modes of operations. 46The default is to read in lines 47from the standard input and randomly write them out 48to the standard output with a probability of 491 / 50.Ar denominator . 51The default 52.Ar denominator 53for this mode of operation is 2, giving each line a 50/50 chance of 54being displayed. 55.Pp 56The second mode of operation is to read in a file from 57.Ar filename 58and randomize the contents of the file and send it back out to 59standard output. 60The contents can be randomized based off of newlines or based off of 61space characters as determined by 62.Xr isspace 3 . 63The default 64.Ar denominator 65for this mode of operation is 1, which gives each line a chance to be 66displayed, but in a 67.Xr random 3 68order. 69.Pp 70The options are as follows: 71.Bl -tag -width Ds 72.It Fl e 73If the 74.Fl e 75option is specified, 76.Nm 77does not read or write anything, and simply exits with a random 78exit value of 0 to 79.Ar denominator 80\&- 1, inclusive. 81.It Fl f Ar filename 82The 83.Fl f 84option is used to specify the 85.Ar filename 86to read from. 87Standard input is used if 88.Ar filename 89is set to 90.Sq Fl . 91.It Fl l 92Randomize the input via newlines (the default). 93.It Fl r 94The 95.Fl r 96option guarantees that the output is unbuffered. 97.It Fl U 98Tells 99.Xr random 6 100that it is okay for it to reuse any given line or word when creating a 101randomized output. 102.It Fl u 103Tells 104.Xr random 6 105not to select the same line or word from a file more than once (the 106default). 107This does not guarantee uniqueness if there are two of the 108same tokens from the input, but it does prevent selecting the same 109token more than once. 110.It Fl w 111Randomize words separated by 112.Xr isspace 3 113instead of newlines. 114.El 115.Sh SEE ALSO 116.Xr random 3 , 117.Xr fortune 6 118.Sh HISTORY 119The 120functionality to randomizing lines and words was added in 2003 by 121.An "Sean Chittenden" Aq seanc@FreeBSD.org . 122.Sh BUGS 123No index is used when printing out tokens from the list which 124makes it rather slow for large files (10MB+). 125For smaller 126files, however, it should still be quite fast and efficient. 127