Here's the answer to the direct question: my $script = int(rand(10)) +1; There's no need to give it an initial seed (via srand) in versions later than 5.004.

However, based on what else you've said, I'd recommend looking into mod_perl (if you run Apache), FastCGI (if you run something else) or ISAPI if you run IIS. Using additional scripts will require separate instances of the Perl interpreter (in the normal case) with additional startup penalties and memory usage. Those are two bugaboos in web programming.

Mod_perl, and ISAPI avoid the startup penalty by embedding a Perl interpreter in the server process, caching the compiled bytecode, and keeping the script active (but sleeping) until it is needed. FastCGI does something similar.

In reply to Re: Random Numbers by chromatic
in thread Random Numbers by Anonymous Monk

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.