MAN page from Trustix openssl-0.9.7m-1tr.i586.rpm

RAND

Section: OpenSSL (1)
Updated: 2001-09-07
Index

NAME

rand - generate pseudo-random bytes

SYNOPSIS

openssl rand[-out file][-rand file(s)][-base64]num

DESCRIPTION

The rand command outputs num pseudo-random bytes after seedingthe random number generator once. As in other openssl commandline tools, PRNG seeding uses the file $HOME/.rnd or .rndin addition to the files given in the -rand option. A new$HOME/.rnd or .rnd file will be written back if enoughseeding was obtained from these sources.

OPTIONS

-out file: Write to file instead of standard output.
-rand file(s): Use specified file or files or EGD socket (see RAND_egd(3))for seeding the random number generator.Multiple files can be specified separated by a OS-dependent character.The separator is ; for MS-Windows, , for OpenVMS, and : forall others.
-base64: Perform base64 encoding on the output.