Re: [PATCH v1 1/2] random-bits: Factor out entropy generating function

[Florian Weimer <fweimer@redhat.com>]

* Jason A. Donenfeld via Libc-alpha:

> _However_, based on what people have said in this thread, this all
> seems highly unnecessary, since you just need some boring
> statistically uniform randomness without any crypto or security
> requirements of any kind, and it simply needs to be fast and dumb. If
> that's the wrong set of requirements for this problem (I still have no
> idea what the bigger picture here is), please pipe up.

If we can make a cryptographically secure generator fast enough, it
would relieve programmers of the need to choose between that and another
generator that just gives some random-looking bits fast.  If programmers
don't have to make a choice, they can't choose incorrectly (introducing
performance bugs or security bugs).

For example, the system call overhead could be prohibitive for things
like hash map keys if these hash maps are not used much before they are
discarded again.

Thanks,
Florian