# writing a lookup for random strings

**URL:** <https://forum.ansible.com/t/writing-a-lookup-for-random-strings/20796>\
**Category:** Ansible Developer\
**Created:** [March 7, 2016, 7:45pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/writing-a-lookup-for-random-strings/20796 "2016-03-07T19:45:30Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![ivica.kolenkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/45deac/32.png) [@ivica.kolenkas](https://forum.ansible.com/u/ivica.kolenkas)\
**Post date:** [March 7, 2016, 7:45pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/writing-a-lookup-for-random-strings/20796/1 "2016-03-07T19:45:30Z")

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Hello,

I am interested in contributing code and I wanted to write a module which would generate a random\_string module as described in this pull request: [https://github.com/ansible/ansible-modules-extras/pull/1799](https://github.com/ansible/ansible-modules-extras/pull/1799)

Sivel and bcoca pointed out that what I wanted to make was more suitable for a lookup, so my questions are:

1. Should I write a new lookup or extend an existing one (namely “password” lookup)?
2. How would I test a lookup? Using it in a playbook is fine by me
3. Is it acceptable for someone who lacks experience in contributing to any OS project to make a pull request to ansible repo?
4. Is the contributing process the same as for modules-extra? Fork, commit, push, create pull request  
Thank you in advance,

Ivica.