Write you some QuickCheck - Generating random floatss

This post is part of a series of posts on implementing a minimal version of QuickCheck from scratch. The source code is available on GitHub.

In this post I’ll be generating random 32-bit floating-point numbers.

In Haskell’s QuickCheck 1.2.0.1 (but also in version 2.8), random 32-bit floating-point numbers are generated as shown below:

instance Arbitrary Float where
  arbitrary     = liftM3 fraction arbitrary arbitrary arbitrary
  coarbitrary x = ...

Two things are important in the above code:

• liftM3
• fraction

Here’s the original fraction function in Haskell:

fraction :: Fractional a => Integer -> Integer -> Integer -> a
fraction a b c = fromInteger a + (fromInteger b / (abs (fromInteger c) + 1))

It takes 3 integers and returns an a which is a fractional (a numeric type that supports the ordinary division operator /).

Here are some sample values generated by fraction:

λ> fraction 1 2 3
1.5

λ> fraction 2 2 2
2.6666666666666665

λ> fraction 7 8 9
7.8

Now, what I want to do is to call the fraction function passing random integers, something like this (pseudo-code):

-- Pseudo-code
fraction Gen<int> Gen<int> Gen<int>

Here’s where liftM3 comes into play:

liftM3 :: Monad m => (a1 -> a2 -> a3 -> r) -> m a1 -> m a2 -> m a3 -> m r

• a1, a2, and a3, correspond to the arguments of fraction
• r corresponds to the return value of fraction
• m a1, m a2, m a3 will be 3 generators for integers
• m r the return value (the random float).

So, in F#, a generator for floats can be written as:

(* Generates a random real number. *)
let float =
    let fraction a b c = float a + float b / (abs (float c) + 1.0)
    Gen.lift3 fraction Gen.int Gen.int Gen.int

And the lift3 function in F# can be written in terms of apply and return:

(* Unpacks a function wrapped inside a generator, applying it into a new
   generator. *)
let apply f m =
    Gen.bind f (fun f' ->
        Gen.bind m (fun m' ->
            Gen.init (f' m')))

(* Returns a new generator obtained by applying a function to three existing
   generators. *)
let lift3 f m1 m2 m3 = Gen.apply (Gen.apply (Gen.apply (Gen.init f) m1) m2) m3

Finally, here are some sample floats:

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = 3.466666667

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = 9.352941176

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = 18.14285714

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = 9.4

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = -16.8

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = -1.5

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = -1.25

> Gen.float |> Gen.generate;;
val it : float = -16.94117647