Advanced view

From BOINC

Contents 1 The Projects tab 1.1 Status messages 1.2 Commands 1.3 Web sites 2 The Tasks tab 3 The Transfers tab 4 The Messages tab 5 The Statistics tab 5.1 Command view 5.2 Mode view 6 The Disk tab 7 BOINC Manager Menus

The BOINC Manager window can be opened from the BOINC icon in the notification area (Windows) or Dock (Mac OS X).

The Projects tab

Shows the projects in which this computer is participating.

Status messages

• Suspended by user: The project is currently suspended.
• Communication deferred ...: The client will wait the specified amount of time before attempting to contact the project server again. If no communication is required at that point, none will be attempted.
• Won't get new tasks: When user clicks the "No new tasks" button in Commands panel, the BOINC client will not fill the cache for this project when it runs out of tasks. To resume project tasks, click "Allow new tasks" button.

Commands

Click on a project name to enable the following additional buttons:

• Allow new tasks: Allow the project to download additional work, if needed.
• Detach: Your computer will stop working for the project. Any tasks still in progress, uploading or to be reported will be discarded!
• No new tasks: Do not download any additional work for this project.
• Reset project: Stop the project's current work, if any, and start from scratch. Use this if BOINC has become stuck for some reason. Any unreported results and tasks in progress will be discarded.
• Resume: Resumes processing of a previously suspended project.
• Suspend: Suspends any further processing of this project.
• Update: Connect to the project; report all completed results, get more work if necessary, and get your latest preferences.

Web sites

Project administrators can add buttons to the manager to quickly navigate the project website.

The Tasks tab

Shows the tasks currently on your computer.

Each task is either:

• Aborted by user: Result has been aborted.
• Downloading: Input files are being downloaded.
• Preempted: Result has been suspended by the client-side scheduler and will be resumed the next time the project comes up in the processing rotation.
• Ready to report: Waiting to notify the scheduling server.
• Ready to run: An estimate of the total CPU time is shown.
• Running: Elapsed CPU time and estimated percent done is shown.
• Suspended by user: Task has been suspended by the user. Use the 'Resume' button on this tab to resume the task.
• Uploading: Output files are being uploaded.
• Activities Suspended: BOINC is suspended, either by the Activity->Suspend menu item or benchmarks are running
• Project suspended by user: Project has been suspended by user. Use the 'Resume' button on the Projects tab to resume the project.

NB: The 6.6 client renamed the CPU time column to Elapsed. CPU time can be seen by selecting an active/waiting to run task and clicking the new Properties button in left margin.

Report Deadline:

• This column specifies when each task is due to be completed. BOINC will automatically increase the priority of tasks that are in danger of missing their deadline. If a deadline is missed, you will continue work on the task, but the task will also be assigned to another user. If the other user completes the task before you do, they get credit and you do not.

Click on a result name to enable the following additional buttons:

• Abort: Abort processing for a result. NOTE: This will prevent you from receiving credit for any work already completed.
• Resume: Resumes processing of a previously suspended task. Note, this applies to tasks with status 'Suspended by user'.
• Show graphics: Open a window showing application graphics. (Only available if that application has graphics, and when the Status is 'running'.)
• Suspend: Suspends any further processing of this task.
• Properties: Opens pop-up window with additional task information (Client 6.4)

The Transfers tab

Shows file transfers (uploads and downloads). These may be ready to start, in progress, and completed.

• Aborted by user: Result has been aborted and will be reported to the project server as a computational error.
• Downloading: Your computer is receiving data from the project server.
• Retry in ...: The client will wait the specified amount of time before attempting to contact the project server again.
• Uploading: Your computer is sending data to the project server.

Click on a file name to enable the following additional buttons:

• Retry Now: Retry the file transfer now.
• Abort Transfer: Abort the file transfer. NOTE: This will prevent you from receiving credit for any work already completed.

The Messages tab

Shows status and error messages. You can control what messages are shown. Messages are also written to the file 'stdoutdae.txt'.

Click on one or more messages to enable the following additional buttons:

• Copy all messages: Copies all the messages to the clipboard.
• Copy selected messages: Copies the highlighted messages to the clipboard. To highlight multiple messages, hold down the CTRL key (Windows) or Command key (Mac) and then click on the messages you want to store in the clipboard. You can then click on the 'Copy selected messages' button to copy them to the clipboard.

The Statistics tab

Shows some simple charts and graphs about the user and host progress.

This feature requires at least three connections to each project scheduler on three different days before it starts working properly.

Command view

Click on any of the buttons to change to a different chart:

• Show user total: Shows your credit totals for each project.
• Show user average: Shows your credit averages for each project.
• Show host total: Shows this computer's credit totals for each project.
• Show host average: Shows this computer's credit averages for each project.

Mode view

Click on any of the buttons to change the view:

• All projects: Show all projects on individual charts.
• One project: Shows one project at a time. The chart and a list of projects will be shown, switch between them using previous project and next project buttons.
• All projects (sum): Shows all projects in one chart.

For the single-graph views, i.e. "One project" and "All projects (sum)":

• left-click to display the X and Y values for any position on the graph
• left-click-drag to highlight an area on the graph you wish to zoom in to
• right-click to reset the graph
• right-click-drag to pan the graph
• double left-click the graph, or the project names legend (sidebar on the right), to hide/show the legend sidebar

The Disk tab

This shows how much disk space is currently being used by each project.

BOINC Manager Menus

The BOINC manager has the following menus:

• File
  • Close Window: minimize the BOINC Manager to the notification area or Dock. Note that closing the manager using the [X] button on the title bar will close the window, not exit BOINC.
  • Exit: exit the BOINC manager and all running BOINC applications. No further work will take place until you run the BOINC manager again. On Mac OS X, this is under the BOINC menu as Quit BOINC.
• View
  • Accessible View: best for screen readers.
  • Grid View: allows column sorting and shows progress bars.
  • Simple View...: switches to the simple view. New in 5.8
• Tools
  • Attach to project: enroll this computer in a project. You will be asked to enter the project's URL and your account details, which is the email address and password you desire to use for an existing or new project registration. For World Community Grid enter the member name and password previously established when registering there (required!). New in 5.10 is that you can select the most popular Projects from a drop down list. Also see topic Choosing and joining projects for more registration information.
  • Account Manager: attach to one or more new projects using an account manager web site. See Account managers.

• Activity
  • Run always: do work, regardless of preferences.
  • Run based on preferences: do work when your preferences allow it.
  • Suspend: stop work (both computation and network).
  • Network activity always available: always allow BOINC to contact the project servers when it needs to.
  • Network activity based on preferences: allow BOINC to contact the project servers only when your preferences allow it.
  • Network activity suspended: setting this keeps BOINC from attempting to contact any of the project servers. It is useful for those on dial-up connections who do not want to be bothered with BOINC prompting to connect or disconnect for a time.
• Notes:
  • Selecting an option that requires contacting a project will temporarily enable network activity regardless of the network setting. This includes updating a project, retrying file transfers, retrying communications and attaching to projects. Network activity will remain enabled for five minutes.
  • Selecting Snooze from the icon menu overrides the 'run....' setting and suspends activity for one hour. Deselecting Snooze, or selecting the Activity menu items Run always or Run based on preferences cancels Snooze.
• Advanced
  • Options: opens a dialog allowing you to select your preferred language, how often you wish to be reminded of the need to connect to the project servers (for dial-up users), etc. If you connect to the web through an HTTP or SOCKS proxy, use this dialog to enter its address and port. You may also enter a comma-separated list of URLs for which a proxy should not be used. Windows only: use this dialog to tell BOINC your method of connecting to the Internet.
  • Preferences: opens a dialog allowing you to override your preferences locally. New in 5.10
  • Select Computer: Allows you to control BOINC on a different computer. You can optional specify a port number (host:port), allowing you to control a client via SSH tunneling New in 6.1. Run the client with the --gui_rpc_port option.
  • Shut down connected client: shut down the currently connected core client.
  • Run CPU benchmarks: run benchmark functions, which measure the speed of your processor. BOINC does this automatically, but you can repeat it whenever you want. The results are shown in the Messages tab.
  • Retry Communications: retry any deferred communications.
  • Read config file: reread configuration info from the cc_config.xml file. New in 5.10
  • Read local prefs file: reread preferences from the global_prefs_override.xml file. New in 5.10

• Help
  • BOINC Manager: open this web page with instructions for using the BOINC manager. The F1 function key also does this.
  • BOINC website: open the main BOINC web page.
  • About BOINC Manager: show BOINC manager version number (on Mac OS X, this command is under the BOINC menu.)

Menu names and other text in the BOINC manager can be displayed in languages other than English.