Random number between 0 and the value of another variable

Hello, Is there an easy way for me to set the value of a one variable as a restriction when generating a random number? Specifically, what I want to do is:

1. "p" is generated as a random number between 0 and 1

2. Generate another variable "q", but there is a restriction that p+q < 1. Since I determined the value of p in the previous step, I'd like q to be something like rand(1-p), but obviously the rand function requires that size inputs must be integers.

Is there a clever way to do this? What I've thought of is making an if statement to check that p + q < 1 before proceeding to the next steps of the code (and repeat the rand function if q happens to be too large), but I thought there may be a simpler solution.

Thanks!

SY

Answer 1

[James Tursa]

q = rand*(1-p);

[SY]

My goodness, it was this simple! Can't believe all I had forgotten was the * sign this entire time. Thanks very much!

SY

Answer 2

[ANKUR KUMAR]

As per my knowledge, there is no any predefined function which do your work. You can write the script as well or you can write function for your convenience.

clc
  clear
  A=rand(5)
  [x y]=find(A>0.5);
  while length(x)>0
  for i=1:length(x)
     A(x(i),y(i))=rand(1);
  end
  [x y]=find(A>0.5);
  end
  A

[SY]

Thanks for the help Ankur!

SY