"Trei, Peter" wrote: [...]
> >Exactly what is the Choatian definition of a PRNG which requires > >it to repeat, anyway? Possibly confusion between 2 common English meanings of "repeat". (1) repeatable, so if someone else runs the same algorithm on similar hardware with the same initial conditions they get the same results, which a program to calculate pi will be. (2) repetitive, so that if you run the algorithim for long enough a given sequence comes round again. Which pi isn't. Of course of pi will have "repeats", in the trivial sense that any given sequence will many times in a sufficiently long enough rendition. But there is no cycle there, just randomness. The decimal digits "12" will occur many times, and "123" will occur rather fewer times, and so on, but it is not repetitive in this sense because seeing "1" followed by "2" gives you no clue that "3" comes next. And seeing "9863770323499906322" gives you no clue that next time you see "986377032349990632" you will get "2" next. (I think - I make no pretence to know much about maths) Ken
