In addition to console, there are other objects built into JavaScript. Down the line, you’ll build your own objects, but for now these “built-in” objects are full of useful functionality.

For example, if you wanted to perform more complex mathematical operations than arithmetic, JavaScript has the built-in Math object.

The great thing about objects is that they have methods! Let’s call the .random() method from the built-in Math object:

console.log(Math.random()); // Prints a random number between 0 and 1

In the example above, we called the .random() method by appending the object name with the dot operator, the name of the method, and opening and closing parentheses. This method returns a random number between 0 (inclusive) and 1 (exclusive).

To generate a random number between 0 and 50, we could multiply this result by 50, like so:

Math.random() * 50;

The example above will likely evaluate to a decimal. To ensure the answer is a whole number, we can take advantage of another useful Math method called Math.floor().

Math.floor() takes a decimal number, and rounds down to the nearest whole number. You can use Math.floor() to round down a random number like this:

Math.floor(Math.random() * 50);

In this case:

1. Math.random() generates a random number between 0 and 1.
2. We then multiply that number by 50, so now we have a number between 0 and 50.
3. Then, Math.floor() rounds the number down to the nearest whole number.

If you wanted to see the number printed to the terminal, you would still need to use a console.log() statement:

console.log(Math.floor(Math.random() * 50)); // Prints a random whole number between 0 and 50

To see all of the properties and methods on the Math object, take a look at the documentation here.