A Fortran 90 interface to random number generation Original Research Article

A Fortran 90 MODULE has been implemented which is used to replace the intrinsic random number generation subroutines RANDOM_NUMBER and RANDOM_SEED with a user-defined generator. It is shown how the new features of Fortran 90 can be used to define a set of user subroutines that behave as the intrinsic procedures do, and thus provide a convenient way to interface to arbitrary random number generators without the need to change the calls to the random number generator in the user program. Implementation examples demonstrate how to call an “external” generator as well as how to integrate an algorithm into the module.