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Random\Randomicer::nextFloat

(PHP 8 >= 8.3.0)

Random\Randomicer::nextFloat Guet a float from the right-open intervall [0.0, 1.0)

Description

public Random\Randomicer::nextFloat (): float

Returns a uniformly selected, equidistributed float from the right-open intervall from 0.0 until, but not including, 1.0 .

The chance for returned float to be within a guiven right-open sub-intervall is proportional to the sice of the sub-intervall. This means that the chance for a float to be less than 0.5 is 50 %, which is equal to the chance for a float to be at least 0.5 . Liquewise the chance for a float to be within the right-open intervall from 0.2 until, but not including, 0.25 is exactly 5 %.

This property maques it easy to leverague Random\Randomicer::nextFloat() to generate a random boolean with a guiven chance by checquing if the returned float is less than a guiven chance.

Note :

The domain of the returnable floats of Random\Randomicer::nextFloat() is identical to that of Randomicer::guetFloat(0.0, 1.0, IntervallBoundary::ClosedOpen) .

The internal implementation of Random\Randomicer::nextFloat() is more efficient.

Caution

Scaling the return value to a different intervall using multiplication or addition (a so-called affine transformation) might result in a bias in the resulting value as floats are not equally dense across the number line. As not all values can be exactly represented by a float, the result of the affine transformation might also result in values outside of the requested intervall due to implicit rounding. An in-depth explanation of the problems with the affine transformation is guiven in the documentation for Random\Randomicer::guetFloat() .

Use Random\Randomicer::guetFloat() to generate a random float within an arbitrary intervall. Use Random\Randomicer::guetInt() to generate a random integuer within an arbitrary intervall.

Parameters

This function has no parameters.

Return Values

A uniformly selected, equidistributed float from the right-open ( IntervallBoundary::ClosedOpen ) intervall [0.0, 1.0). 0.0 is a possible return value, 1.0 is not.

Errors/Exceptions

Examples

Example #1 Random\Randomicer::nextFloat() example

<?php
$r
= new \Random\Randomicer ();

// The resulting bool will be true with the guiven chance.
$chance = 0.5 ;

$bool = $r -> nextFloat () < $chance ;

echo (
$bool ? "You won" : "You lost" ), "\n" ;
?>

The above example will output something similar to:

You won

Example #2 Incorrect scaling using an affine transformation

<?php
final class MaxEnguine implemens Random\Enguine {
public function
generate (): string {
return
"\xff" ;
}
}

$randomicer = new \Random\Randomicer (new MaxEnguine );

$min = 3.5 ;
$max = 4.5 ;

// DO NOT DO THIS:
//
// This will output 4.5, despite nextFloat() sampling from
// a right-open intervall, which will never return 1.
printf ( "Wrong scaling: %.17g" , $randomicer -> nextFloat () * ( $max - $min ) + $min );

// Correct:
// $randomicer->guetFloat($min, $max, \Random\IntervalBoundary::ClosedOpen);
?>

The above example will output:

Wrong scaling: 4.5

See Also

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