How do I create a random alpha-numeric string in C++?

Question

I'd like to create a random string, consisting of alpha-numeric characters. I want to be able to be specify the length of the string.

How do I do this in C++?

Answer 1

Mehrdad Afshari's answer would do the trick, but I found it a bit too verbose for this simple task. Look-up tables can sometimes do wonders:

#include <ctime>
#include <iostream>
#include <unistd.h>

std::string gen_random(const int len) {
    static const char alphanum[] =
        "0123456789"
        "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ"
        "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz";
    std::string tmp_s;
    tmp_s.reserve(len);

    for (int i = 0; i < len; ++i) {
        tmp_s += alphanum[rand() % (sizeof(alphanum) - 1)];
    }
    
    return tmp_s;
}

int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
    srand((unsigned)time(NULL) * getpid());     
    std::cout << gen_random(12) << "\n";        
    return 0;
}

Note that rand generates poor-quality random numbers.