Mike,

I guess it's more economic to do it in software rather than in hardware.
(It's a commercial product.)

It 's OK to allow a handful of boards to start at the same time. What we
want to avoid is that all the boards (20, 30 or more) to start at the same
time.

Tony

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dipperstein, Michael" <mdippers@HARRIS.COM>
To: <PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2001 1:26 PM
Subject: Re: [PIC]: Generating a "truly" random number on the application of
power


> Why not just delay the application of power to each board?  If you have a
> control pin to spare, you can build a system that where it's the job of
each
> board to allow power to flow to the next.
>
> In any random number scheme, you still have the possibility that all
generators
> will generate the same number and come up at the same time.  This can't
happen
> when it's the job of one board to apply power to the next.
>
> -Mike
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tony Pan [mailto:weidong.pan@verizon.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, August 14, 2001 10:18 AM
> To: PICLIST@mitvma.mit.edu
> Subject: [PIC]: Generating a "truly" random number on the application of
> power
>
>
> Hi,
>
> In our project, several identical boards are connected together. Normally,
> on the application of power, they will be turned on at the same time and
> starting running at the same time. But we don't want that to happen. If
all
> boards are running at the same time, they will consume too much power and
> cause a problem.
>
> So, we want to impose a lockout time at the beginning of the software; the
> lockout time should be random for each board (though they use the same
> software). Only after the lockout time expires would the program start
> running. Thus the boards will start at different time and won't cause a
> power shortage.
>
> My question is: how to generate a "truly" random number on the application
> of power. The number should not be determined upon the compilation of the
> software, but should be upon the initial powerup of the chip. (Or, it
should
> be determine by each individual chip.)
>
> Help?
>
> (By the way, I write my program in C and use PICC compiler.)
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> Tony Pan
>
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