Re: [boost] [random][rational] Is there any standard way to generate a random rationals?

Subject: Re: [boost] [random][rational] Is there any standard way to generate a random rationals?
From: John Maddock (jz.maddock_at_[hidden])
Date: 2015-03-10 07:37:59

> there's no nearest rational number, as there are inifinetly many of them in
> any bounded neighbourhood of any real number. Unless by nearest you mean
> the nearest rational with the greatest representable denominator... but in
> this case the result will not be uniform anymore. As said, uniformity (
> meaning prob(x in [a,b])=b-a ) seems fundamentally impossible for rationals
> for the aforementioned reasons ...

That not withstanding, the conversion from floating point to rational is 
*exact*.  So floating point values in the range [1/INT_MAX, INT_MAX] 
would map exactly to rational values in that range.  Whether they have 
the distribution you want is another matter.

John.