> What's the best way to model an unfair coin? > > This is one way to do it, I suppose: Create a list containing only > 'H's and 'T's. If you want the coin to have the probability of a head > to be 6/11, > > ['H', 'H', 'H', 'H', 'H', 'H', 'T', 'T', 'T', 'T', 'T'] > > is the list to use. Use random.choice on the list, for a 6/11 heads > probability. > > See <http://tutoree7.pastebin.com/gxKYkYWW>. > > That's the only way I can think of. But surely there's a better, more > general solution. What if the probability I want is an irrational > number, such as 1/e? Sure, I can calculate a fraction that's as close > to that irrational number as I want, but..
My statistics might be too rusty to have this correct, but I would do something similar as you have now, just not for integer numbers. Assuming you only want True or False, you can use a uniform distribution, through random.random(), and see if the result is lower or higher than your probability. Eg: return random.random() < 1/e or return random.random() < 6/11. will return True or False with your specificied probability. Again, I just might be overlooking something in the statistics. Cheers, Evert Btw, to be pedantic, 1/e is not an irrational number, just a real number. i/e would be. > > Am I missing something that's already there in Python 2.6 or 3.1 (the > 2 I have)? > > Dick Moores > _______________________________________________ > Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org > To unsubscribe or change subscription options: > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor _______________________________________________ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
