WIN32_SEEDER WINAPI WS_create_instance( SEEDER_TYPE type, SEEDER_ERROR *reason )This function can be used to create a new seeder instance. The first parameter of the function is used to tell Winseed if a new slow seeder or a new fast seeder should be created. If the value of the parameter type is WIN32_SLOW_SEEDER a slow seeder is created and if it has the value WIN32_FAST_SEEDER a fast seeder is created. Any other value is not allowed. If the creation of the seeder failed the variable to which the parameter reason points is used to return an error code, which describes the reason for the failure. The possible error codes are described at error reference. WS_create_instance does not check whether the parameter reason is NULL.
The difference between a slow seeder and a fast seeder is that a call to WS_get_seed is computationlly less expensive for a fast seeder than it is for a slow seeder. On the other hand slow seeders return much more data which is in turn expected to contain much more entropy. For Windows 95/98 it also has to be mentioned that the data which is returned by a slow seeder does not change too much over time. Therefore data gathered by a slow seeder should be supplemented by additional data obtained from a fast seeder.
Return values:
If the function call fails NULL is returned. If it succeeds a non NULL value is returned.