C++ Random Engine Benchmark

random-bench.cc

// LICENSE: CC-0 
// © 2015 by Karolin Varner
// invoke: $ echo boost::random::taus88 boost::random::minstd_rand0 boost::random::minstd_rand boost::random::mt11213b boost::random::mt19937 boost::random::mt19937 std::default_random_engine std::minstd_rand std::minstd_rand0 std::mt19937 std::mt19937_64 | tr ' ' '\n' |while read en; do clang -lboost_random -lboost_system -lstdc++ --std=gnu++11 -DENGINE="$en" -Wall -Wextra bench.cc -o bench; ./bench; done | sort -k2 | column -t

#include <boost/uuid/seed_rng.hpp>
#include <boost/random/taus88.hpp>
#include <boost/random/mersenne_twister.hpp>
#include <boost/random/linear_congruential.hpp>
#include <boost/random/uniform_int_distribution.hpp>
#include <boost/random/uniform_real_distribution.hpp>

#include <random>
#include <chrono>
#include <iostream>

using namespace std::chrono;

const unsigned int seed = 40641766;

#define STR_(a) #a
#define STR(a) STR_(a)

int main() {
  ENGINE engine;
  engine.seed(seed);

  high_resolution_clock::time_point t1,
      t0 = high_resolution_clock::now();

  for (int i = 0; i < 1000000000; i++)
      engine();

  t1 = high_resolution_clock::now();
  duration<double> time_span =
        duration_cast<duration<double>>(t1 - t0);

  std::cout << STR(ENGINE) << " " << time_span.count()
            << "s" << std::endl;

  return 0;
}

results

boost::random::mt19937        10.4222s
boost::random::mt11213b       10.6539s
boost::random::mt19937_64     10.7993s
std::mt19937                  11.0515s
std::mt19937_64               11.0959s
std::minstd_rand0             16.2256s
std::minstd_rand              16.3615s
std::default_random_engine    16.5868s
boost::random::taus88         26.7123s
boost::random::minstd_rand    38.5173s
boost::random::minstd_rand0   38.7661s
std::ranlux24                128.103s