Random.Next() always return 0??
This question came up on an internal
list recently… Thought I’d share it with you…
Q: We have created a System.Random
object and shared it among multithreads.
After calling m_random.Next() for awhile (eg. 1 day), it stops generate
any random but only return zero. I realize that random is not thread safe. I interpreted it as it might return the
same random (in race condition) not that it will only return zero after
sometime.
A: This comes up now and then. As you note, and as we say in the docs,
the class is not threadsafe. That
means anything can happen. In this
case it looks like the seed is getting corrupted. Consider this fix:
class
ThreadSafeRandom
{
private static Random random
= new Random();
public static int
Next()
{
lock
(random)
{
return random.Next();
}
}
}
Also, if you are using this for any
kind of security\privacy purposes, we suggest using the Random number generator
in the System.Security namespace: RandomNumberGenerator.
