I was going to post this as a foot-note to another, less than helpful, thread but decided it was too off topic.


Seems to be a common comment here on the forums that BOINC is retreating into the same open source morass of blaming users for: being dumb ; want a usable interface for the project ; not being {relevant-subject-matter-area} gurus so their input is unwelcome here etc. Just what is getting Wikipedia a lot of negative press recently.

SETI used to be a very simple, error/trouble free process. UD is a no-brainer setup.

BOINC and the science-brains behind the projects need to remember it's volunteers providing the CPU cycles (and paying the hardware and power bills) and make sure that while the apps are the best that they can be in terms of science number crunching that they're easier to install and administer for any level of knowledge than reading email...

Sadly neither the client (not being able to set preferences locally for a specific client, come on!), the setup process, these forums, the project structures and the general tone and chaotic nature of the project seem to go any way towards helping solve that problem.

I don't mean this as an attack on the very few, hard-working core individuals - their work is amazing both in architecting this thing, and delivering it, but... they need to get a usability and (probably not or!) a marketing expert to help make this whole darn thing a lot smoother an experience if you want to reach a tipping point and become a seti@home type household name... and keep the users who just want to contribute some CPU cycles on-side and signing up.

I almost gave up on signing up for other projects after getting SETI installed simply because the process was too hard and I couldn't set / manage preferences / priorities for individual machines easily (or share the projects across the machines intelligently based on workload, deadlines and capabilities)

Oh and why is the core site here at boinc.berkeley.edu, the stats sites and utilities all seperate, the oh-so-handy wiki at http://boinc-doc.net/ and all the good TLD domain names for boinc taken - perhaps a snappy URL with all the relevant content in one place is too marketing

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Random Thoughts

The difficulties in setting up BOINC are known, and work is on-going to try to make it happen. RIghtly you point out that we are not there yet. There is a fairly long list of usability enhancements on the list of things to do. But, these oft times take a back seat to the usability of making it work at all.

Many of the recent changes were an attempt in that direction. The fact that we did not quite get there should not overshadow the fact that probably the majority had a relatively trouble-free migration. Cold comfort if you did not have that. I have to admit that I have had a hard time along the way because BOINC has always installed and run for me right out of the box with no issues. Heck, when some people could not run for 20 minutes without a GPF, I was happily runing 24/7 ...

The other choices were made on a deliberate, and I think wise basis. Since BOINC is to be multi-project of unknow and ever growing scope it was felt that all but the most vital parts would be "farmed out". In particular, statistics was made as minimal as possible on the basic project sites. For the simple reason that this lets the developers concentrate on the important aspects of the system. This does require that the participant find another place to get any kind of advanced look at their data. And, so far, I have not found one statistics site that does it all for me (yet). So, I use Willy's and BOINC Synergy. Some things I think Willy does better, others, BOINC Synergy. Twixt the two I get what I desire.

Because BOINC is open source, it is also impossible for the UCB site to be everything, or even a center point for all projects. They do, again, provide the bare minimum to get us by. But, again, in part economics, in part choice they only make a list of widely known projects that are in production.

Documentation *IS* another weak point, for which the volunteer Unofficial BOINC-Wiki is attempting with greater or lesser success to alievieate. In our defense, there are far more hours put into development than documenting, if for no other reason that there are more people that can write code than can write English.

There are two places where, perhaps, we may see significant improvement in time for BOINC with regard to single point of access and ease of use. One is WCG which may grow into more than just a project of projects. The other is a Account Manager site that is in development now.

Anyway, there was some thinking behind the choices, though it is easy to disagree with the choices made (I too would like to see the ability to make changes to preferences locally).

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thanks Paul,
I understand the work-load and allocation of resource that must go into all this.
I find threads like my experiences here quite discouraging though. Newbies need nurture not terse RTFMs

I'm sure over time the client / manager evolution will continue - hopefully with input from the real world rather than the ivory tower... sometimes 'pure' function has to be overlaid with a veneer of usability or (even better) user friendliness...

It would be great to at least make the links to boinc-doc.net more prominent on the boinc.berkeley.edu site (and encouragine the various projects to link to it and contribute knowldege) so people can find the resource without having to dig (and dig and dig!)

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Random Thoughts

It would be great to at least make the links to boinc-doc.net more prominent on the boinc.berkeley.edu site

I agree.

Unfortunately, a lot of people don't know what a wiki is and so it doesn't occur to them to click on the provided link (on the Seti boards)

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JOIN Team ACC

thanks Paul,

Yoiu are welcome. :)

Its why I tried ...

I understand the work-load and allocation of resource that must go into all this.
I find threads like my experiences here quite discouraging though. Newbies need nurture not terse RTFMs

In an ideal world yes. "Knowing" the other participants as I do, well, I am not quite sure why this transaction turned out badly; and don't think I want to get too deep into that debate.

I *DO* know we try to "nurture" as best we can. In my case, well, I have not been able to do much "heavy lifting", nor, to be honest, do I feel that it is encombant on me to do everyones research to provide direct links. Perhaps it is a personal thing. What I do know is that far to many expect detailed, precise, complete, and individual answers. In many cases when that is known to be "impossible".

My favorite "bad" example is the question "What is this 'Credit' thing and how does it work?"

That question probably has more pages related to it than just about any other page/question in the BOINC universe as it touches validation, cobblestones, benchmarks, quorums, etc.

In this specific reference I too missed one point, but I was misled by the way you posed the question. So, my advice was incomplete.

I'm sure over time the client / manager evolution will continue - hopefully with input from the real world rather than the ivory tower... sometimes 'pure' function has to be overlaid with a veneer of usability or (even better) user friendliness...

Very true. And, if we had time, talent, and additional effort this would be true. But, the sad fact is that with limited resources there is only so much that can be done. The upcoming Account Manager sites may help. There is also a fledgling effort to redesign the interface to something that is easier to use. There is discussion on the developers list if you would like to participate. Not sure where that is going to go, or even if it is going to get off the ground.

Sadly, the history of many of the self-proclaimed "experts" is that they are long on complaint and explanation on how if they were in charge that we would be in nirvana. Yet, when you try to pin them down to exactly how things would be changed you get the explanation that they are "vision" level people.

Sadly, what is needed is more work and less "vision". I get at least one request a month for edit access to the Wiki. WHen I ask for samples of work, guess how many responses I get. Truth be told, all this stuff is hard. It is just like a beginning discussion on the SETI@Home boards, sadly it is a good idea, sinking under the unpleasent fact that this ground has already been plowed and NO ONE came up with a rule set that couild not be broken, and, in the mean time provided effective relief of the problem ...

It would be great to at least make the links to boinc-doc.net more prominent on the boinc.berkeley.edu site (and encouraging the various projects to link to it and contribute knowldege) so people can find the resource without having to dig (and dig and dig!)

We have tried.

We have even tried to make the Wiki official. We came close. But, I folded when the idea was to:

a) start over
b) limit the content

So, I did not think that this was the way to go and stayed "Unofficial". We have made progress in that almost all projects do give at least passing reference to the WIki as a source. And the volunteers do provide recomendations to people to use it. But, my ability to convince the projects to help me to expand the project specific content has met with limited success. If you want to see what I would like to see from all projects, look at what Chris Randle did from CPDN. I got all the stuff from Classic developed material to standard references they make to threads ... simply wonderful ...

And, when I can, I try to co-opt people like Kinhull to take the best of their work and fold it into the Wiki, if possible. We also refer out where possible.

I proposed a concept where the BOINC Manager would, on pressing F1 take you to a page directly. Again, if you look at the UCB help page, and what we write in the BOINC Application Owner's Manual you can see why I did not want to limit the content ... :)

But that idea too died. I suggested that the Help link be "programmable" so that with a configuration change the participant could point to their help site of choice. That died too. I am not a C++ programmer (my autistic brain can't grasp the notion that the programming language should be designed for maximum obscurity, see the wiki for my thoughts on C++), and not likely to become one. And if I did, well, when I would be able to work I would be adding to the back log of stuff that was not documented. So, I cannot code a change and submit it for inclusion. I *DO* know that if it is good, works and solves issues it WILL be included in the baseline.

That being said. e-mail Dr. Anderson and tell him what you think, you may even get a reply. But he is busy so, don't plan on it being a long one. Even better, post on the project or developer's mailing list. Start discussions. But, if you come across as hostile, well, you won't get far. And many good ideas die aborning.

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I understand the work-load and allocation of resource that must go into all this.
I find threads like my experiences here quite discouraging though. Newbies need nurture not terse RTFMs

In an ideal world yes. "Knowing" the other participants as I do, well, I am not quite sure why this transaction turned out badly; and don't think I want to get too deep into that debate.

personalities I guess. my Father always used to tell me "if you don't have anything nice to say... say nothing" so I'm going to leave that thread well alone.

I *DO* know we try to "nurture" as best we can. In my case, well, I have not been able to do much "heavy lifting", nor, to be honest, do I feel that it is encombant on me to do everyones research to provide direct links. Perhaps it is a personal thing. What I do know is that far to many expect detailed, precise, complete, and individual answers. In many cases when that is known to be "impossible".

I agree sometimes it's not the answer to simply give someone a fish - you have to teach them to use the rod and line... but where the answer may require some hunting and following of links that's possibly a little daunting for a first timer (I know how much fun I had getting remote control working on my Mac for instance) some links or possibly the creation of a 'recipie' that outlines the steps with some context to encourage a newbie to take those steps is worthwhile (we used to do that for new programmers on a number of projects I ran) can only benefit all - and hopefully save six other projects having to do it on their forums as well!

In this specific reference I too missed one point, but I was misled by the way you posed the question. So, my advice was incomplete.

well, the title of the quote was supposed to be < rant > but sadly it got censored! Which of course lost some of the impact and positioning!

Sadly, the history of many of the self-proclaimed "experts" is that they are long on complaint and explanation on how if they were in charge that we would be in nirvana. Yet, when you try to pin them down to exactly how things would be changed you get the explanation that they are "vision" level people.

Ha! How did you guess what I do for a living?! I'm the "vision" guy for a project that averages 2m page impressions a day. But then again I'm also the only ASP Developer and SQL Server guy to I have to be able to make my ideas stick. Sadly these aren't really skills that can help out much on this project. But a decade of marketing, communications and selling software to people who didn't understand why then needed it (neither did I, but I could still train them to use it afterwards!) might....

We have even tried to make the Wiki official. We came close. But, I folded when ...

Must get very depressing. I assume it's politics? ALl this duplication of work and obscurification of information much be so frustrating. And they say scientists are smart! You would think that the various science projects would see the value in having a good central resource just to cut down the amount of work their volunteers have to do!

That being said. e-mail Dr. Anderson and tell him what you think, you may even get a reply. But he is busy so, don't plan on it being a long one. Even better, post on the project or developer's mailing list. Start discussions. But, if you come across as hostile, well, you won't get far. And many good ideas die aborning.

Funny, that's the second time someone has suggested it. I've obviously managed to come across as hostile (or at least as an unhelpful writer of asinine diatribes too stupid to be helped) and some people.... obviously it's the land of egg-shells around here ;)

After that I was in two minds between a quick uninstall of BOINC or not... having read your response second stayed my hand.

And if I can think of a way to help without falling foul of politics and egos (and the aliens who are actually behind the SETI project) then I'll wade on in.... as long as I don't have to touch C++ source code (ah, I do still miss 68000 assembler though)!

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Random Thoughts

Not going to quote as I wonder it that does not just get in the way sometimes.

We do have some guides. Take a look. When you start to realize that some of those are a week or two's worth of work, well, how many guides can you write. Worse, many times it seems people don't want to use some thing like the guides we wrote.

"Vision" is good. I am not knocking it. BUt if that is all there is, well, sorry, not much help. My point is that *IF* you stick around BOIC for awhile there seems to be "types" that show up. Sad but true, evolution equiped us with stereotypes to allow us to deal with a complex world. So, start off with the behavior of a "type" and it is easy to get stuck into it.

It was not so much politics as different, um, visions of what was needed. Who is to say that mine is right? Or his? This was another point I tried to advance a long time ago that it would be "smart" to set-up some sort of more official community. There is a little movement in that direction. BUt, this is a classic case where perhaps the principles are too close to the problem and without "independent" ways of reconciling the viewpoints we get stuck. I understand Dr. Anderson's position. I just don't agree with it.

Well, my opinion of scientists has been shrinking of late. But, it is not likely that my wishes are going to change the world. Doesn't mean I don't try.

Lastly, yes, you did come across negatively. Remember, those of us that "patrol" the boards do not take threads in isolation. We all get a reputation. WIth some I am an over enthusiastic cheerleader that cannot see that BOINC is fatally flawed, optimization is always the best option, that the design is fatally compromised because ....

In many cases, in *MY* opinion, the problem is not with BOINC, its design, or whatever. It is a misunderstanding of the intent of the design. And in fulfilling that intent, what appears to be a fatal flaw is actually a design choice that does make sense from the system perspective.

So, yes, you did come across negatively and that was why the suggestion.

Note I did not take umbrage at your comments. But, in the other thread I was explaining the "why" of it. If there was a better way of doing it I would be using it... I just have not found it. Oh, and migration of the data takes months ... I still have not moved all the material off the old site, though usage statictics say that this is not a huge problem.

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test

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Boinc Wiki

Sometimes I hate my Bob Newhart style of humor.