I agree a stable rng is important. We use maxima to generate random
online problems for students, from a template and seed. (see
http://eee595.bham.ac.uk/~stack) A stable and documented rng is very
important for us also.
Chris
On Mon, 10 Jan 2005, Raymond Toy wrote:
> >>>>> "Robert" == Robert Dodier writes:
>
> Robert> We have in hand a portable rng. I claim this is preferable
> Robert> to the status quo. A suggestion is to make mt19937 the default
> Robert> Maxima rng until someone comes up with an improved rng
> Robert> (faster or whatever).
>
> I think it is good that all platforms use the same rng by default. It
> should be something that has been well-tested and is reasonably fast.
> And whatever we pick, it should be good so that we don't go changing
> it again at some later time just because something faster or better
> comes along. I think we should proceed cautiously, but this is a good
> time to make the change since so much is also happening.
>
> I used to do lots of Monte Carlo simulations, and it's quite annoying
> to have rng's change so that the old results differ from the new when
> you're trying to debug code. Even starting from a different seed is
> annoying.
>
> Ray
>
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