Best way to generate NSData object with random bytes of a specific length?

Question

If I create a new NSData object of a specific size using dataWithBytes:length:, what is the most efficient way to create the input bytes (20 Mb worth) of random characters, pref

Answer 1

urandom is more efficient.

Here is a category to generate random buffers:

@interface NSMutableData(Random)
+(id)randomDataWithLength:(NSUInteger)length;
@end

@implementation NSMutableData(Random)
+(id)randomDataWithLength:(NSUInteger)length
{
    NSMutableData* data=[NSMutableData dataWithLength:length];
    [[NSInputStream inputStreamWithFileAtPath:@"/dev/urandom"] read:(uint8_t*)[data mutableBytes] maxLength:length];
    return data;
}
@end

Answer 2

The original version has a bug but mine takes care of that and hopefully doesn't introduce any new one. Hope it helps.

- (NSData *)randomDataWithBytes: (NSUInteger)length {
    NSMutableData *mutableData = [NSMutableData dataWithCapacity: length];
    for (unsigned int i = 0; i < size; i++) { 
        NSInteger randomBits = arc4random();
        [mutableData appendBytes: (void *) &randomBits length: 1];
    } return mutableData;
}

Here is its unit test:

NSInteger givenLength = INT16_MAX;
NSData *randomData = [self randomDataWithBytes: givenLength];
STAssertTrue([randomData length] == givenLength,
             @"RandomDataWithBytes Failed Expected size %d and got %d", 
             givenLength, [randomData length]);

Answer 3

You can create a 20*2^20b NSData object, then append a random 4 byte integer to it 20*2^20/4 times with arc4random(). I believe you need to include stdlib.h (via Generating random numbers in Objective-C).

#include <stdlib.h>

-(NSData*)create20mbRandomNSData
{
  int twentyMb           = 20971520;
  NSMutableData* theData = [NSMutableData dataWithCapacity:twentyMb];
  for( unsigned int i = 0 ; i < twentyMb/4 ; ++i )
  { 
    u_int32_t randomBits = arc4random();
    [theData appendBytes:(void*)&randomBits length:4];
  }
  return theData;
}