--- a/Random.st	Thu Oct 02 16:31:02 2014 +0200
+++ b/Random.st	Thu Oct 02 16:50:55 2014 +0200
@@ -264,9 +264,14 @@
     "return a number useful for seeding.
      This takes the current processor's time, plus the processor's process id,
      plus some value depending on the memory allocation state,
-     plus a random salt."
+     plus a random salt, and shuffles those bits around.
+     The entropy returned should be reasonable enough for a good seed of a good rnd
+     generator. However, keep in mind, that it only has a limited number of entropy bits
+     (in the order of 32). 
+     But it shoud be much better than what is commonly used in older
+     programs (current time) or even a constant."
 
-    |newSeed|
+    |newSeed hash|
 
     RandomSalt isNil ifTrue:[
         RandomSalt := 1.
@@ -279,11 +284,35 @@
     [
         newSeed := newSeed bitXor:(OperatingSystem getCPUCycleCount).
     ] on:PrimitiveFailure do:[].
-    newSeed = 0 ifTrue:[ newSeed := Time microsecondClockValue ]. "/ how likely is that
-    ^ newSeed.
+
+    "/ any other easy sources of entropy?
+
+    "/ how likely is that? - paranoia
+    newSeed = 0 ifTrue:[ newSeed := Time microsecondClockValue ]. 
+
+    "/ The above gives us a 5-8 byte number, but some high bits are constant.
+    "/ (the constant high bits from the above do not provide any entropy)
+    "/ so the effective entropy is more in the order of 32 bits.
+    "/ if called shortly in a row, the returned values are only affected by
+    "/ the amount of memory allocated in between (and if there are any newspace reclamations),
+    "/ the real time in between and the number of cpu cycles between,
+    "/ plus the salt counter.
+    "/ Hashing should make this less likely to be predicted.
+
+    "/ I think there is no problem in that MD5 is not a secure hash algo here - the idea is to shuffle the bits around a bit
+    "/ (because the numbers above usually have many high bits in common)
+    "/ and then condense the bits into a smaller number.
+    "/ Any comment from a crypto guy here - I am willing to change this to some other hash, if that makes a problem
+
+    hash := MD5Stream hashValueOf:(newSeed asLargeInteger digitBytes).
+    "/ still the same number of entropy bits, bit no longer limited to an unknown number of low bits,
+    "/ bit arbitrarily spread among the hash bytes.
+    "/ Seeding rnd generators should Xor the returned 8 bytes to their max. seed size
+    ^ LargeInteger digitBytes:hash.
 
     "
-     self randomSeed bitAnd:16rFFFFFFFF  
+     10 timesRepeat:[Transcript showCR:self randomSeed].
+     self randomSeed bitAnd:16rFFFFFFFF
     "
 ! !
 
@@ -737,10 +766,10 @@
 !Random class methodsFor:'documentation'!
 
 version
-    ^ '$Header: /cvs/stx/stx/libbasic2/Random.st,v 1.54 2014-10-01 15:32:58 cg Exp $'
+    ^ '$Header: /cvs/stx/stx/libbasic2/Random.st,v 1.55 2014-10-02 14:50:55 cg Exp $'
 !
 
 version_CVS
-    ^ '$Header: /cvs/stx/stx/libbasic2/Random.st,v 1.54 2014-10-01 15:32:58 cg Exp $'
+    ^ '$Header: /cvs/stx/stx/libbasic2/Random.st,v 1.55 2014-10-02 14:50:55 cg Exp $'
 ! !