Why a Random Nodeshell button?

Because some of us in E2 like to fill the holes (but with quality material), I'd like to see a "Random Nodeshell" function in Epicenter or Vitals or whatever. To prevent abuse by less-experienced TNRT wannabes, it could be a level power (around level 4 or so, alongside C!).

How would it work?

Whenever a nodeshell is visited (such as when a new e2node is created or the last writeup is killed), the system adds its title (or node_id, if that would be more efficient) to a set of nodeshells. Whenever a writeup is added to an e2node, its title is removed from the list. The "Random Nodeshell" script would simply choose a random element from said list and redirect the browser to the appropriate node.

Could it be generalized?

Yes! As a user setting, the Random Node scripts could use this list of nodeshells (and also possibly a list of e2nodes that contain only Webster 1913 writeups) to keep them out of Random Node(s) results. Turning The Big Nodeshell List into a superdoc would be trivial this way.

So where's the code?

The Everything engine is written in Perl, and I know no Perl as of March 3, 2001. (For details, see my homenode, under "Idiomas que hablo.")