Talk:Random password generator

message: What's the real main article for this page? Examples is a redirect page.
Also, these code fragments are very poor. They seed the random number generator based on the time of day, so if I know the server's time of day when the account was created, I know the password!
-- Mikeblas 01:07, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I rewrote the article using the code fragments as examples of what not to do. No offense intended to the original submitter; these are all too common mistakes and that is why i think this article is needed. --agr 23:00, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Older thread

message: The paragraph about the problems with the C standard library random number generator is irrelevant. For generation of an ASCII password, as long as the possible range of outputs is larger than the number of acceptable ASCII characters - from decimal 33 to decimal 126 - the absolute size of the output is unimportant. The random number will be modded by 94 anyway.
The small number of possible outputs of the C standard library rand() function is indeed important - but only when the full range of numbers is used, such as in a cryptographic hash. It need not be mentioned here, and is in fact misleading and confusing when it is. What is significant is the potential size of the seed - since the generator is deterministic up to seed choice, an attacker who knew the algorithm for generating the password from a given random number could simply test the results of all possible seed values, if the maximum seed size is small. -- GFett (talk) 18:43, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I tried to clarify what naive means here. I'd be interested in opinions on whether the code examples should stay.--agr (talk) 18:04, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think these code examples are good. Also, I think in this context a "naive programmer" would be a programmer who uses code that has similar issues that are displayed in the examples.Smittycity42 (talk) 22:32, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

text: I like the code of what not to do.  I would also like additional examples of what should be done.  The word "naive" describes to me a normal first try without knowledge.  Some call that "hacking".  I think hacking should be encouraged.  Hacking anything is a good start as you will make mistakes. I find I learn much from my mistakes.  
Thank you to all this article's authors.  BTW is there a case for changing this article's title to Random Password Generator Software or Programming?
- Cheers, John S Woler (talk) 15:15, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  In Section "Naive Approach" 

message: The subject of password generation and web sites was briefly touched upon.
But it fails to mention some sites attempt to track users, or inventory the usage, allow the webpages to be cached, or use unsecure forms of scripting or third party tools...
Also, it seems that websites which only offer a secure connection and no login are rare.
The following site is secure, non-tracking, etc, and gives pseudo-random passwords freely.
Should it's URL be included in the "External links" section?
https://www.grc.com/passwords.htm  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.231.103.110 (talk) 17:05, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the link should be listed, not only is it a good place to get a strong password, they even explain how those particular passwords are generated.Smittycity42 (talk) 22:27, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Password generator programs and Web sites 

message: Hey what is Non-alphanumerical in passwords§♦javascript:insertTags('%E2%99%A6',,)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.0.43.217 (talk) 22:50, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Non-alphanumerical! 

message: I noticed that the python code snippet that samples the OS entropy pool will never use the same character twice. I'm pretty sure this is bad as this reduces the search space for a brute force attack. By my calculation the search space is reduced from 62^{10}  to 62! / (62 - 10)! or 8.4\times10^{17} to 3.9\times10^{17}. Not all that bad, but if you use this to make a large password (say 62 chars long which is the largest you can do with this snippet without breaking as there are only 62 unique chars available) then the difference starts to matter as it is ≈10^{111}(allows duplicates) to ≈10^{85}. I'll gladly contribute a new snippet as soon as a finish it.Smittycity42 (talk) 10:44, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Python code snippit 

message: What does this do?
rand() creates a random number and the next random number follows on from this
srand(rand()); creates another random number, then sets the start the be the value it was going to start from anyway
so srand(rand()) is equivalent to rand() [citation needed]87.102.44.18 (talk) 14:35, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  srand(rand());