[1] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

random \ran"dom\ ra^n"du^m, n. oe. randon, of. randon
   force, violence, rapidity, `a randon, de randon, violently,
   suddenly, rapidly, prob. of german origin; cf. g. rand edge,
   border, ohg. rant shield, edge of a shield, akin to e. rand,
   n. see rand, n.
   1. force; violence. obs.
      1913 webster

            for courageously the two kings newly fought with
            great random and force.               --e. hall.
      1913 webster

   2. a roving motion; course without definite direction; want
      of direction, rule, or method; hazard; chance; -- commonly
      used in the phrase at random, that is, without a settled
      point of direction; at hazard.
      1913 webster

            counsels, when they fly
            at random, sometimes hit most happily. --herrick.
      1913 webster

            o, many a shaft, at random sent,
            finds mark the archer little meant   --sir w.
                                                  scott.
      1913 webster

   3. distance to which a missile is cast; range; reach; as, the
      random of a rifle ball. --sir k. digby.
      1913 webster

   4. mining the direction of a rake-vein. --raymond.
      1913 webster
see also:
rand 

[2] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

random \ran"dom\, a.
   1. going at random or by chance; done or made at hazard, or
      without settled direction, aim, or purpose; hazarded
      without previous calculation; left to chance; haphazard;
      as, a random guess.
      1913 webster

            some random truths he can impart.     --wordsworth.
      1913 webster

            so sharp a spur to the lazy, and so strong a bridle
            to the random.                        --h. spencer.
      1913 webster

   2. statistics of, pertaining to, or resulting from a
      process of selection from a starting set of items, in
      which the probability of selecting any one object in the
      starting set is equal to the probability of selecting any
      other.
      pjc

   3. construction of unequal size or shape; made from
      components of unequal size or shape.
      pjc

   at random in a manner so that all possible results have an
      equal probability of occurrence; for processes, each
      possible result is counted separately although the same
      type of result may occur more than once .

   random courses masonry, courses of stone of unequal
      thickness.

   random shot, a shot not directed or aimed toward any
      particular object, or a shot with the muzzle of the gun
      much elevated.

   random work masonry, stonework consisting of stones of
      unequal sizes fitted together, but not in courses nor
      always with flat beds.
      1913 webster
see also:
at random random courses random shot random work 

[3] : WordNet (r) 2.0

random
     adj 1: lacking any definite plan or order or purpose; governed by
            or depending on chance; "a random choice"; "bombs fell
            at random"; "random movements" ant: nonrandom
     2: taken haphazardly; "a random choice"
see also:
nonrandom 

[4] : Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0

138 moby thesaurus words for "random":
   accidental, adventitious, adventitiously, aimless, aleatoric,
   aleatory, amorphous, any which way, anyhow, anywise, arbitrarily,
   arbitrary, around, at random, blobby, blurred, blurry, broad,
   by chance, capricious, casual, casually, causeless, chance,
   chance-medley, chancy, chaotic, confused, designless, desultory,
   disarticulated, discontinuous, disjunct, disordered, dispersed,
   disproportionate, driftless, dysteleological, erratic, erratically,
   fitful, foggy, formless, fortuitous, fortuitously, frivolous,
   fuzzy, general, gratuitous, haphazard, haphazardly, hazy,
   helter-skelter, hit-or-miss, ill-defined, immethodical, imprecise,
   inaccurate, inchoate, incidental, incidentally, incoherent,
   indecisive, indefinable, indefinite, indefinitely, indeterminable,
   indeterminate, indiscriminate, indiscriminately, indistinct,
   inexact, inexplicable, irregular, irregularly, lax, loose,
   meaningless, mindless, misshapen, nonspecific, nonsymmetrical,
   nonsystematic, nonuniform, obscure, occasional, occasionally, odd,
   orderless, planless, potluck, promiscuous, purposeless,
   random shot, randomly, senseless, serendipitous, serendipitously,
   shadowed forth, shadowy, shapeless, spasmodic, sporadic,
   stochastic, straggling, straggly, stray, sweeping, systemless,
   unaccountable, unarranged, uncalculated, unclassified, unclear,
   undefined, undestined, undetermined, undirected, ungraded,
   unjoined, unmethodical, unmotivated, unordered, unorganized,
   unplain, unplanned, unpremeditated, unpremeditatedly, unsorted,
   unspecific, unspecified, unsymmetrical, unsystematic,
   unsystematically, ununiform, vague, veiled, wandering

[5] : Jargon File (4.3.1, 29 Jun 2001)

random adj. 1. unpredictable closest to mathematical definition;
   weird. "the system's been behaving pretty randomly." 2. assorted;
   undistinguished. "who was at the conference?" "just a bunch of random
   business types." 3. pejorative frivolous; unproductive; undirected.
   "he's just a random loser." 4. incoherent or inelegant; poorly chosen;
   not well organized. "the program has a random set of misfeatures."
   "that's a random name for that function." "well, all the names were
   chosen pretty randomly." 5. in no particular order, though
   deterministic. "the i/o channels are in a pool, and when a file is
   opened one is chosen randomly." 6. arbitrary. "it generates a random
   name for the scratch file." 7. gratuitously wrong, i.e., poorly done and
   for no good apparent reason. for example, a program that handles file
   name defaulting in a particularly useless way, or an assembler routine
   that could easily have been coded using only three registers, but
   redundantly uses seven for values with non-overlapping lifetimes, so
   that no one else can invoke it without first saving four extra
   registers. what randomness 8. n. a random hacker; used particularly
   of high-school students who soak up computer time and generally get in
   the way. 9. n. anyone who is not a hacker or, sometimes, anyone not
   known to the hacker speaking; the noun form of sense 2. "i went to the
   talk, but the audience was full of randoms asking bogus questions". 10.
   n. occasional mit usage one who lives at random hall. see also j.
   random, some random x. 11. uk conversationally, a non sequitur or
   something similarly out-of-the-blue. as in: "stop being so random" this
   sense equates to `hatstand', taken from the viz comic character "roger
   irrelevant - he's completely hatstand."


see also:
randomness j. random some random x 

[6] : The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (27 SEP 03)

random
     
        1. unpredictable closest to mathematical definition; weird.
        "the system's been behaving pretty randomly."
     
        2. assorted; undistinguished.  "who was at the conference?"
        "just a bunch of random business types."
     
        3. pejorative frivolous; unproductive; undirected.  "he's
        just a random loser."
     
        4. incoherent or inelegant; poorly chosen; not well organised.
        "the program has a random set of misfeatures."  "that's a
        random name for that function."  "well, all the names were
        chosen pretty randomly."
     
        5. in no particular order, though deterministic.  "the i/o
        channels are in a pool, and when a file is opened one is
        chosen randomly."
     
        6. arbitrary.  "it generates a random name for the scratch
        file."
     
        7. gratuitously wrong, i.e. poorly done and for no good
        apparent reason.  for example, a program that handles file
        name defaulting in a particularly useless way, or an assembler
        routine that could easily have been coded using only three
        registers, but redundantly uses seven for values with
        non-overlapping lifetimes, so that no one else can invoke it
        without first saving four extra registers.  what randomness
     
        8.  a random hacker; used particularly of high-school students
        who soak up computer time and generally get in the way.
     
        9.  anyone who is not a hacker or, sometimes, anyone not
        known to the hacker speaking.  "i went to the talk, but the
        audience was full of randoms asking bogus questions".
     
        10.  occasional mit usage one who lives at random hall.  see
        also j. random, some random x.
     
        jargon file
     
        1995-12-05
     
     
see also:
deterministic randomness j. random some random x jargon file 

Random >> R Words
Random, definition of term: Random
random_pag1.html

Random Sample >> R Words
Random Sample, definition of term: Random Sample
random+sample_pag1.html

Random Numbers >> R Words
Random Numbers, definition of term: Random Numbers
random+numbers_pag1.html

Dynamic Random >> D Words
Dynamic Random, definition of term: Dynamic Random
dynamic+random_pag1.html

Random...
... ..
http://www.randomhouse.com/, score=100, date indexed=December 29, 2005, 10:23 pm

Random House Children's Books
... ..
http://www.randomhouse.com/kids/, score=96, date indexed=December 29, 2005, 7:04 pm

Random Internet Cameras
...The Random Internet Camera offers a view of any one of hundreds of ... ..
http://www.xmission.com/~bill/randcamera.html, score=94, date indexed=December 21, 2005, 2:00 am

... ..
http://www.webring.org/cgi-bin/webring?random;ring=ww2, score=94, date indexed=December 21, 2005, 3:43 am

... ..
http://www.webring.org/cgi-bin/webring?ring=livecams&random, score=94, date indexed=December 21, 2005, 3:10 am

Teachers@Random
...The Society of Illustrators has chosen to honor several Random House ... ..
http://www.randomhouse.com/teachers/, score=94, date indexed=December 29, 2005, 7:07 pm

Page 1 2 3 Next