Generating random numbers

Sometimes you need to generate random numbers, perhaps in a game that simulates rolls of a die, or for use with cryptography in encryption or signing. There are a couple of classes that can generate random numbers in .NET.

Generating random numbers for games

In scenarios that don't need truly random numbers like games, you can create an instance of the Random class, as shown in the following code example:

var r = new Random();

Random has a constructor with a parameter for specifying a seed value used to initialize its pseudo-random number generator, as shown in the following code:

var r = new Random(Seed: 12345);

Good Practice: Shared seed values act as a secret key, so if you use the same random number generation algorithm with the same seed value in two applications, then they can generate the same "random" sequences of numbers. Sometimes this is necessary, for example, when synchronizing a GPS receiver with...