RANDOM
RANDOM returns a FLOAT BINARY(53) random number generated using x as the given seed. If x is omitted, the random number generated is based on the seed provided by the last RANDOM invocation with a seed, or on a default initial seed of 1 if RANDOM has not previously been invoked with a seed.
- x
- Expression. x must have a computational
type and should have an arithmetic type. If x is
numeric, it must be real. If x is not specified
FIXED BINARY(31,0),
it is converted.
Unless 0 < x < 2,147,483,646, the ERROR condition is raised.
The values generated by RANDOM are uniformly distributed between
0 and 1, with 0 < random(x) < 1. They are generated as follows
using the multiplicative congruential method:
seed(x) = mod(950706376 * seed(x - 1), 2147483647)
random(x) = seed(x) / 2147483647
The seed is maintained
at the program level and not within each thread in a multithreading
application.