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Re: feature request: sleep --random
From: |
Pádraig Brady |
Subject: |
Re: feature request: sleep --random |
Date: |
Fri, 18 Sep 2009 12:37:41 +0100 |
User-agent: |
Thunderbird 2.0.0.6 (X11/20071008) |
Philip Rowlands wrote:
> This would help with some work I'm doing today, but is it of general
> interest?
>
> $ sleep --random 4.0
>
> sleeps for a random amount of time up to and including the requested
> value. The purpose is that on distributed systems it's disruptive to
> have synchronized scripts all starting up together. One option is to use
> the shell's $RANDOM if available, but it's lot of typing to get true (vs
> coarsely quantized) randomness.
Be careful with random sleeps:
http://www.stdlib.net/~colmmacc/2009/09/14/period-pain/
You're right that the existing is more verbose
but it's also more general:
sleep $(seq .1 .1 4 | head -n $(($RANDOM%40 +1)) | tail -n1)
I'm not sure we should add this.
cheers,
Pádraig.