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From: gwyn@smoke.brl.mil (Doug Gwyn)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: I'm confused about this
Keywords: getpid(), srand
Message-ID: <14536@smoke.brl.mil>
Date: 20 Nov 90 17:35:07 GMT
References: <3945@vela.acs.oakland.edu>
Organization: U.S. Army Ballistic Research Laboratory, APG, MD.
Lines: 12

In article <3945@vela.acs.oakland.edu> jmwojtal@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Wojo) writes:
-I got this C program and this part I don't understand:
-int   getpid();
-long  now;
-now = time(&now) / rand();
-srand(getpid() + (int)((now >> 16) + now + time(&now)));
-What does "srand" do to be exact?  It doesn't bring a value back?
-"getpid()" is declared, but the function is not in the program.

srand() initializes the seed for the pseudo-random number generator rand().
getpid() returns the process ID of the current process.
These are in the UNIX programmer's reference manual, q.v.