$RANDOM
on bash returns a random integer between 0 and 32767.
echo $RANDOM
9816
echo $RANDOM
30922
If you want to limit that to a certain maximum, you can just compare against the modulus of that maximum + 1. \
For example, the following will yield results between 0 and 9:
echo $(($RANDOM % 10))
5
echo $(($RANDOM % 10))
9
Note that this skews random numbers to the lower regions of your boundaries in most cases.
Posted by Arne Hartherz to makandra dev (2013-07-15 09:12)