Code Snippet: Random Strings

Within these castle walls be forged Mavens of Computer Science ...

— Merlin, The Coder

Select a Random String from an Array

Swift

// Select a random string from an array and print the result
let verbs = ["walk", "jump", "run", "swim", "dance"]                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                
let verb = verbs[Int.random(in:0..<verbs.count)]                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    
print(verb)

// Select a random string from an array and print the result (with syntactic sugar)
let verbs = ["walk", "jump", "run", "swim", "dance"]
if let verb = verbs.randomElement() {// Note: randomElement() returns an optional string
    print(verb)
}

// Select multiple random strings from two arrays and print the results 
let geographicFeatures = ["river", "lake", "ocean", "mountain", "desert"]
let verbAndPrepositions = ["walk to", "jump over", "run to", "dance around"]

for _ in 0 ..< Int.random(in: 3...5) {
    let verb = verbAndPrepositions.randomElement()!
    let geographicFeature = geographicFeatures.randomElement()!
    print("\(verb) the \(geographicFeature)")
}

Python

import random

verbs = ["walk", "jump", "run", "swim", "dance"]
verb = random.choice(verbs)
print(verb)

import random

verbs = ["walk", "jump", "run", "swim", "dance"]
verb =  verbs[random.randint(0, len(verbs)-1)]
print(verb)

Java

// Select a random string from an array and print the result
let verbs = {"walk", "jump", "run", "swim", "dance"}
// We'll use the Random class to generate a random number between 0 and verbs.length-1 (don't forget to import the class)