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Profile David Anderson
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Message 62900 - Posted: 3 Jul 2015, 17:39:36 UTC

The BOINC project has transitioned to a community-based governance model. This model is summarized here and described in detail here.
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Message 62905 - Posted: 4 Jul 2015, 9:13:24 UTC

David Anderson wrote:
BOINC's funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation has ended, at least for the time being.
This funding supported me, Rom Walton, and Charlie Fenton.
We're now working on other things, although we'll stay involved in BOINC at some level.

The BOINC project will continue, and will be run according to a community-based model rather than centrally.
In essence, the people who contribute to BOINC now make the decisions about it.
This model is summarized here: http://boinc.berkeley.edu/trac/wiki/ProjectGovernance and described in detail here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1C6pU5RqidYBxk9oyAevm1yH1tn4Hw27oM8YpvsnR-gg

There will probably be little visible change.
The BOINC software will continue to work.
The translation system, Alpha testing project, BOINC web site,message boards, and email lists will continue to operate.
However, any new development and major bug fixes to BOINC will need to be done by volunteer programmers.
I'm confident that the BOINC community will meet the challenge.

I welcome your feedback.
Please post it to boinc_admin@googlegroups.com, a new email list for discussions about the BOINC project as a whole.

-- David
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Message 63012 - Posted: 11 Jul 2015, 22:29:39 UTC - in response to Message 62905.  

Firstly, I am concerned about the lack of publicizing such a major change. It is hidden in a list that not many users see. Its importance is even lost in a one sentence thread in the BOINC Forum until Ageless pointed this out and quoted the main elements of the change. It is not even mentioned in any of the Stat Sites that users frequent often.

Secondly, Since it is supposed to be based on Community Consensus, where is the community input in appointing members of the PMC. I see that there are two members representing Stat Sites, High Academic representation from Project Management and one or two Developers. I don't see this as a balanced representation of the BOINC Community. I concede that the initial appointment needed to be made in a hurry hence no Community input but it is unbalanced. Volunteer users for example are not represented. Ageless for example who have been listening to users complaints and suggestions in the BOINC Forum for years would have been an ideal candidate to represent the users. There are others who for years have been providing a service for testing your software and report its faults should also be represented.

Just my two cents worth...
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Message 63015 - Posted: 12 Jul 2015, 14:25:39 UTC - in response to Message 63012.  
Last modified: 12 Jul 2015, 14:26:48 UTC

I did send in an email to the lists:

It has been a week since the news about the new Governance BOINC came out. Time for some of the questions that keep people busy:

Programming: "In all cases, contributors are expected to work as part of the community." You and Rom have been adding code- and bug-fixes this past week. Are you exempt from having to discuss any of your code with the rest of the community, or is this only for newcomers or only for new feature code?

Documentation: what of those users that have an editor account already, will their account continue to work as it was before?
What of those with administrator power but not mentioned as a committer?
Which changes are they allowed to make, is this with or without consent of the community/PMC?
When do they have to ask the committers for help?
Can any page be added without permission, or do I have to ask permission every time I want to add a page?

Communication channels: "The project will provide communication channels for various purposes: PMC public email list..." So far, none has been provided.

PMC: why was it decided to add a PMC?
Why not have just one or two deciders?
Who has decided who is in the initial group?
Were they all asked, or were they appointed?
Is there any transparency in how they were chosen?
How about they introduce themselves on the (PMC) email list?
When did they decide that David should become their chairman?
Why isn't there already one or two people from the community included?

Email lists: what's the boinc_admin googlegroup for and what does it add that the boinc_* email lists don't already have?
Will the boinc_* email lists from Berkeley die out now?
You ask that people email you on boinc_admin@googlegroups.com, but don't tell that they should go to https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/boinc_admin to register as member of that group, as else they will not receive emails from that group, or answers to their question if someone chooses to only answer to boinc_admin* like what happened with the answer to Nicolás Alvarez. It isn't intuitive that these groups need registration to be able to follow the conversation on there.

The News Is Not Out There: "BOINC is a community-based open-source project." But at the same time, the community that is supposed to make this project is not informed of their role. I have made a trawl through all of the projects on the http://boinc.berkeley.edu/projects.php list, plus some added from bookmarks. In all I searched in about 45 project forums and found discussion about this new Governance BOINC in just three (!!) of them (Bitcoin Utopia, WCG and Seti).
It's not even discussed in any of the project forums of the people named in the PMC, apart from WCG and Seti. And only in the thread on the latter has one person from the PMC answered once (Rom). All threads seem to have died out now.

News like this should have been sent through the Notices to reach as many people from the community as possible.
Also the timing of the news was a bit suspicious, posting it on the 3rd of July, right before all of America is away for pre-celebrations of the 4th of July and the start of vacation time in a lot of countries in the Northern Hemisphere. It's as if the news shouldn't have been out there, or that it needs downplaying on the importance of the change. The one line, two sentences 'News' bit on the BOINC front page didn't make it any clearer either. Even I didn't recognize it as 'THE ANNOUNCEMENT', which is why I asked you to post the news on the BOINC website.

Apart from two follow-up mails from members of the community, this news has been met with total silence. Either it isn't received by anyone, no one understands what you meant, or no one cares. Or the importance of it is lost on everyone. I would've expected something more, or at least someone else with a lot of questions like I am now sending in. But since that time, it's been total silence in this thread. So perhaps a renewed explanation is needed, or a teleconference. Put a video about it on Youtube?

Last, something that Rom said and has me thinking: "A new grant request has been submitted to the NSF based on feedback from various sources. We don't expect to hear anything back from NSF until early next year." .. does that mean that when you find new funding, that you turn off the community-based BOINC again, thank all members of the PMC and go back to how it was developed/produced before?

I'll leave it there, for now. It's possible I come up with additional questions, but will wait first to see what, if anything, I get back on these.
In the mean time, I'll link to the threads I mentioned in the three project forums, in case people want to read up on them.

Bitcoin Utopia http://www.bitcoinutopia.net/bitcoinutopia/forum_thread.php?id=887
WCG http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/forums/wcg/viewthread_thread,38168
Seti https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=77650


So far, I got as answers, these from Rom Walton:
Jord wrote:
Programming: "In all cases, contributors are expected to work as part of the community." You and Rom have been adding code- and bug-fixes this past week. Are you exempt from having to discuss any of your code with the rest of the community, or is this only for newcomers or only for new feature code?

Difference in rolls I suppose. Committers are assigned areas of responsibility (See section 2.3) where they are expected to evaluate bug reports and code submissions. Sections 4 and 5 talk about the scope of things committers are expected to do on a day-to-day basis.

Right now most of the feature areas and the various areas of responsibility are on David's and my plate. I suspect things will start changing as we start working through the new model of doing things.

Jord wrote:
Documentation: what of those users that have an editor account already, will their account continue to work as it was before?
What of those with administrator power but not mentioned as a committer?
Which changes are they allowed to make, is this with or without consent of the community/PMC?
When do they have to ask the committers for help?
Can any page be added without permission, or do I have to ask permission every time I want to add a page?

Is there something specific you want to address? How were these things addressed before the change over?
How do you think they should be addressed now?

Jord wrote:
PMC: why was it decided to add a PMC?
Why not have just one or two deciders?

David has joked a time or two that one of his biggest fears was me being hit by a bus.

I guess you could say that the PMC is a logical outgrowth of that kind of concern. What would happen to the project if something happened with David and I. With the PMC in place there is a logical place for the community to look to keep things together.

Jord wrote:
Who has decided who is in the initial group?

David, one of his last official acts in the benevolent dictator role.

Jord wrote:
Were they all asked, or were they appointed?

Asked and they agreed to be a part of it.

Jord wrote:
Is there any transparency in how they were chosen?

Not really.

Jord wrote:
When did they decide that David should become their chairman?

June 10th

Jord wrote:
Will the boinc_* email lists from Berkeley die out now?

Not as far as I know.

Jord wrote:
Last, something that Rom said and has me thinking: "A new grant request has been submitted to the NSF based on feedback from various sources. We don't expect to hear anything back from NSF until early next year." .. does that mean that when you find new funding, that you turn off the community-based BOINC again, thank all members of the PMC and go back to how it was developed/produced before?

I don't think this is something you walk back.

----- Rom

and this from David Anderson:
Jord wrote:
Programming: "In all cases, contributors are expected to work as part of the community." You and Rom have been adding code- and bug-fixes this past week. Are you exempt from having to discuss any of your code with the rest of the community, or is this only for newcomers or only for new feature code?

David wrote:
The governance doc says:

Committers have no more authority over the project than contributors. Their work is visible to the community (e.g. in a commit history) and can be reviewed by the community. The key difference is that this review happens after the change is made, rather than before.
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Message 63021 - Posted: 12 Jul 2015, 20:36:16 UTC - in response to Message 62900.  

The BOINC project has transitioned to a community-based governance model. This model is summarized here and described in detail here.



Professor Anderson,

I copied over the extended message to Free-DC and the following projects:

Asteroids@home
ATLAS@Home
Cosmology@Home
DENIS@Home
Einstein@Home
Enigma@Home
LHC@Home Classic
MilkyWay@home
SETI@Home
SETI@Home Beta
theSkyNet POGS
Universe@Home
vLHCathome
World Community Grid
WUProp@Home


Perhaps others (hint, hint) can pass along to the other projects too as so below. I've been posting to the Number Crunching forums where it's most likely to be seen. I'll leave it to the project admins if they want to post it to their news...


Topic: BOINC transitioning to a Community Based Governance

Body:
BOINC transitioning to a Community Based Governance...
http://boinc.berkeley.edu/dev/forum_thread.php?id=10370


David Anderson wrote:

BOINC's funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation has ended, at least for the time being.
This funding supported me, Rom Walton, and Charlie Fenton.
We're now working on other things, although we'll stay involved in BOINC at some level.

The BOINC project will continue, and will be run according to a community-based model rather than centrally.
In essence, the people who contribute to BOINC now make the decisions about it.

This model is summarized here: http://boinc.berkeley.edu/trac/wiki/ProjectGovernance
and described in detail here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1C6pU5RqidYBxk9oyAevm1yH1tn4Hw27oM8YpvsnR-gg

There will probably be little visible change.
The BOINC software will continue to work.
The translation system, Alpha testing project, BOINC web site,message boards, and email lists will continue to operate.
However, any new development and major bug fixes to BOINC will need to be done by volunteer programmers.
I'm confident that the BOINC community will meet the challenge.

I welcome your feedback.
Please post it to boinc_admin@googlegroups.com, a new email list for discussions about the BOINC project as a whole.

-- David
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Message 63022 - Posted: 12 Jul 2015, 21:00:53 UTC - in response to Message 63021.  

I copied over the extended message to Free-DC and the following projects:

SETI@Home
World Community Grid

A for effort, but a C for execution. As I already said in a post in this thread, Seti, Bitcoin Utopia and WCG already had threads on the subject, I even linked to their threads.
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Message 63023 - Posted: 12 Jul 2015, 21:09:14 UTC - in response to Message 63021.  

David Anderson wrote:
BOINC's funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation has ended, at least for the time being.
-- David


I think one of the visible results of this will be the end of Boinc Workshop...
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Message 63024 - Posted: 12 Jul 2015, 21:53:06 UTC - in response to Message 63023.  

David Anderson wrote:
BOINC's funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation has ended, at least for the time being.
-- David


I think one of the visible results of this will be the end of Boinc Workshop...

Not necessarily. I do not espect that the National Science Foundation should fund the wages etc of certain organizers, and neither can I see that ordinary users would have sufficient spare cash to pay such overseas venues of this nature. There are other options where you can stay at home and join the venue via Video Conferencing for example. If the PMC is strong and represent all form of volunteers than it can be organised without too much cost.
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Message 63028 - Posted: 13 Jul 2015, 16:13:30 UTC

An Answer from Christian Beer:

Hi fellow members of the BOINC Community,

I want to address some of the points made here or in the forum threads
Jord mentioned and provide my point of view to this. As a longtime BOINC
contributor I feel honored to be a member of the PMC and I will continue
and hopefully intensify my contribution to BOINC as a project.

The PMC was established to discuss and formulate the strategic goals of
BOINC not the operational day-to-day activities of contributors and
committers. So for most people directly involved in maintaining BOINC it
is business as usual with the difference that now everything needs to be
done in free time. I hope that the PMC will encourage contributors (old
and new) to come forward and present new ideas or suggest changes to
BOINC or the governance model as a whole. I don't see this as something
set into stone and it is sometimes easier to find a majority among a
group of people than in a single individual.

From what I read in the forum discussion about the governance change is
that the group of "Users" as a stakeholder feels it is underrepresented
in the PMC. I didn't have the feeling when I saw the list as I consider
Matt and Willy as representatives of the "User" community. But it's also
clear to me that if the community wants this to change, the process is
clear. Find someone who is willing to accept a position in the PMC and
post to this mailing list. I would be willing to initiate a vote so this
person becomes a member of the PMC and is part of the decision process.

Another point I want to make clear is the distinction between "Users"
and "Contributors" in respect to the BOINC project. A "Contributor" is
someone who contributes code, writes documentation or helps other
"Users" with problems. It is not someone who contributes computing time
through BOINC to a scientific project, that is clearly a "User". See the
sections 2.1 and 2.2 in the governance document.

As the discussion in the several forums revolve around the governance
model I would suggest to discuss this first (on the boinc_admin google
group). Please focus on changes to the current model.

MfG / Regards
Christian Beer
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Message 63069 - Posted: 14 Jul 2015, 19:50:49 UTC - in response to Message 63022.  

I copied over the extended message to Free-DC and the following projects:

SETI@Home
World Community Grid

A for effort, but a C for execution. As I already said in a post in this thread, Seti, Bitcoin Utopia and WCG already had threads on the subject, I even linked to their threads.


Somebody needed to post about it, so I did. I wasn't looking for glory. I was hoping others would hit the rest of the projects. I just went down my list. Einstein and DENIS have moved it to the News sections already which would be the preferable place.

For the projects, yes, the impact will probably be minimal, probably some contact changes although Professor Anderson will still be around. However, there are those that would like to know what's happening with BOINC. For those who just merrily run it, unless there's some kind of critical bug, if David and Rom had both disappeared, the projects wouldn't have been impacted. ;)

Cheers.
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Message 63076 - Posted: 15 Jul 2015, 7:58:40 UTC

I am sorry guys, for I was all confused. My interpretation of the BOINC Governance change from what David Anderson said that he is handing over the Governqance or if you like the Management of BOINC to a Community Based system where the Community Consensus will dictate for he certainly indicated that in his mission statement..

I was wrong, I got confused between the meaning of Governance model of the whole BOINC Community, that is all stake holders, Userts, Project ,managers etc, and an alternative meaning using the same name that only refers to the Software Management aspect of BOINC although the words Software Management is not mentioned in the mission statement. This confusion is illustarted by a member of the current Project Managemnt Committee (PMC). See full text of emails [url]https://groups.google.com/forum/#!search/BOINC/boinc_admin/aq_stcsZ49c/yTUe1GFEI4QJ] Here [/url]

Christian Beers states: "The BMC (lets call it that) is responsible for THE BOINC project. The source code that can be compiled into the client. The principal investigator (I think he means Instigator) of BOINC has decided to turn control over the Software Development Community in general. The BMC does not have control over the usefulness or activity of the Project Adminstrators."

The above bags the question, who is in charge of the day to day activities of the project overall. It is not the PMC for Christian stated that activity is in the hands of contributors and committers. After eleven days to date they are all nameless faces, their responsibility have not been made and there is no change from previous administration where nobody can give a clear statement that this is a policy of BOINC. We as users are left to make up our mind in absence of any Administartive policy weather we should trust any project and in deed weather they are doing what they are doing is legal and legitimate. The BOINC software and the Berkely administration will not admit to control the use of the software and any Tom, Dick and Henry can start a project because the Management Committe does not care who uses the software and for what purposes.

Time to search out other Scientific project based software issued by other Universities that runs Non BOINC but Sientific projects like Folding and numerous others. Leave BOINC to gamers or any individual who wishes volunteers to donate their computers for unknown reasons. We have a good Offical Forum to discuss matter relating to BOINC but the management tries to keep us in the dark by running numerous obscure lists and offside group discussion in Google for example. It is working. 97% of the community said nothing in eleven days. Is it because they do not care or is it because it was intended to be hidden?[/url]
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Message 63078 - Posted: 15 Jul 2015, 13:51:26 UTC - in response to Message 63076.  

Some clarification seems to be needed here.

We as users are left to make up our mind in absence of any Administartive policy weather we should trust any project and in deed weather they are doing what they are doing is legal and legitimate. The BOINC software and the Berkely administration will not admit to control the use of the software and any Tom, Dick and Henry can start a project because the Management Committe does not care who uses the software and for what purposes.

BOINC is open source, anyone can create their own project for their own purpose and it is up to them to create a community around their project. Nothing has changed there. You, as a contributor, decide your level of trust and involvement in any BOINC project, always. UCB may stop at endorsing any particular project, but they certainly never controlled any of them. PMC/BMC would act no differently there.

Time to search out other Scientific project based software issued by other Universities that runs Non BOINC but Sientific projects like Folding and numerous others. Leave BOINC to gamers or any individual who wishes volunteers to donate their computers for unknown reasons.

Yup, you possess the absolute freedom to do that, any time you so choose. You always have had that freedom.

We have a good Offical Forum to discuss matter relating to BOINC but the management tries to keep us in the dark by running numerous obscure lists and offside group discussion in Google for example.

I think this criticism is both unfounded and unfair. I have no doubt that this has been an incredibly difficult time for the project team and I believe that they have done what they deemed best, given that the financial rug supporting this project has been pulled out from under them. Google groups is cheap and available internationally and unencumbered by UCB list access/permission policy. What's the better alternative than Google?

It is working. 97% of the community said nothing in eleven days. Is it because they do not care or is it because it was intended to be hidden?[/url]

I suspect that the majority of the community (your 97%) doesn't even need to know and probably wouldn't even notice. They are users. They download a client, connect, crunch, get help from the message boards if necessary. Not many of them interact at the BOINC co-ordinator level. They interact with their project and project administrators. As long as there's a binary download or their repository contains a client, what more do they really need to know? This is one of the intrinsic benefits of BOINC, a simple interface to a highly complex and hidden ecosystem.

The remainder (your 3%) that are discussing this will be sufficiently motivated to engage further, which they are doing and the new Governance structure will accommodate that.
ralic's law of forums: Irrespective of any prior research done, you will find the solution to your question shortly after posting it to a public Internet forum, resulting in readers concluding that you have done no research on the matter whatsoever.
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Message 63125 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 8:03:31 UTC - in response to Message 63078.  

Some clarification seems to be needed here.

[quote]We as users are left to make up our mind in absence of any Administartive policy weather we should trust any project and in deed weather they are doing what they are doing is legal and legitimate. The BOINC software and the Berkely administration will not admit to control the use of the software and any Tom, Dick and Henry can start a project because the Management Committe does not care who uses the software and for what purposes.


BOINC is open source, anyone can create their own project for their own purpose and it is up to them to create a community around their project. Nothing has changed there. You, as a contributor, decide your level of trust and involvement in any BOINC project, always. UCB may stop at endorsing any particular project, but they certainly never controlled any of them. PMC/BMC would act no differently there.


That is a fair enough answer for it is documented so. I wish to point out though that to date the BOINC System and that is the Software Component and Documemntation was controlled by one person. There was no clear process of review. There was no community involvement or need to find a consensus of the user. This was a Dictatorial system. Therefore the public was duped. Now that David Anderson is no longer getting paid, he is too busy managing other interests and he passed the controlling management to his friends that helped him before. He said: Boinc has transitioned to a Community based Governance and in his documents he has referred to a Community Based Consensus. What he did not say is that the members of the Project Management Committee is appointed by him without Community consensus. As stated by one of the PMC members, they are not empowered to deal with questions of Day to Day problems and questions and we will not get an answer from the PMC on such questions. Yet David stated that Committers have no more authpority than contributers the question is begged to be asked who included statement in the documentation and why? Oh, hang on users not supposed to know that, users do not need to know that, all thay have to do is download the software and use it.

I submit this is just my point of view. Just a few days ago David was interviewed on UTube and unless I am blind and dumb, I could have sworn that he said that BOINC was created to help in Scientific Research. He never mentioned that anybody including Terrorist Organisation may use it for it is an Open In frastructure Software with no rules. If such thing happens it will not be the fault of the software for BOINC passed responsibility for using to the user neither BOINC or the University of Berkely is responsible for anything in the software or its documentation. I beleive that is one basis for discussion alone.

I sir am not dumb and neither am I a sheep. The backbone of the New Governing system is in place. Now is the time to voice your opinion if you do not like what is going on for David stated that input is welcome (at some place that I have no time to find at the moment) you should find the link in this thread. I have said my point of view there as was requested. I am not demanding anything. I am just a voice crying out in the wildreness. I can offer suggestions but that is only one users opinion. What I do ask is that if anybody asks a question there please give some indication when may we receive an answer. I do not need an immediate reply, an idication would be nice for i might just think that it will never be answered. If you look at any good software support system if you ask a question, the system will give a reference number and tells you that a reply will be provided in a certain number of hours, days, months or years as needed. I am refering to the questions Jord asked. Some questions were answered with a question and I am still curious what is the official reply that was asked for it effects me as well.

What I am upset about is that BOINC is not transparent. It hides elements from the public view and makes decisions without Community consensus or awarness. Only 26 members of the Community at large have read the admin_list since it was started 17 days ago. Why wern't we asked what should be included in the Governing Document? Why PMC appointments made without consultation? We are not even introduced who they are and what their responsibilities are? Stakeholders are not informed because I am told this is a Software Development Committee. Since David has handed over responsibility am I to trust faceless individuals who only care about the code of the software. Who makes documentary statements and desitions, another group of faceless people. No, it can't be for Jord asked this question. A PMC members said that it is made by the contributors and Committers. David states that conmmitters have no more authority than contributors. Than who is the authority who already included this in the documentations. There is no appointed committee that is open and transparent. A PMC memebrs states that it is up to the committesr and contributors. Now, hang on, I was appointed by David to manage the list of known BOINC Project List and he stated manage it as you see fit. That makes me a committer by the terminology used that means I do not need to aks anybody, I can just go ahead and make a rule without consultation. Is this the intention. I submit the PMC needs a lot of work and clarification for this is not a professional system that one should trust and waste money on. The venue has been set. go ahead and voice your opinion at the appointed list. I am not asking or demanding anything here, I am just generalizing.

Time to search out other Scientific project based software issued by other Universities that runs Non BOINC but Sientific projects like Folding and numerous others. Leave BOINC to gamers or any individual who wishes volunteers to donate their computers for unknown reasons.


Yup, you possess the absolute freedom to do that, any time you so choose. You always have had that freedom.


We have a good Offical Forum to discuss matter relating to BOINC but the management tries to keep us in the dark by running numerous obscure lists and offside group discussion in Google for example.


I think this criticism is both unfounded and unfair. I have no doubt that this has been an incredibly difficult time for the project team and I believe that they have done what they deemed best, given that the financial rug supporting this project has been pulled out from under them. Google groups is cheap and available internationally and unencumbered by UCB list access/permission policy. What's the better alternative than Google?


I bag to differ on this but I respect your views. What was the need to hurry and why was this such a difficult time. They all had the same time as Einstein or Houdini. What we need is community involvment not just a system of Dictatorship. A critical review of decision is needed in order to create a software and suitable documentation that suits most stakeholders. But as I said before, I am just one voice. You can fool some of the people some of the time but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.

It is working. 97% of the community said nothing in eleven days. Is it because they do not care or is it because it was intended to be hidden?[/url]


I suspect that the majority of the community (your 97%) doesn't even need to know and probably wouldn't even notice. They are users. They download a client, connect, crunch, get help from the message boards if necessary. Not many of them interact at the BOINC co-ordinator level. They interact with their project and project administrators. As long as there's a binary download or their repository contains a client, what more do they really need to know? This is one of the intrinsic benefits of BOINC, a simple interface to a highly complex and hidden ecosystem.


I am sorry I disagree. I joined BOINC at the time of SETI Classic for I was under the impression that by allowing somebody to enter my computer I need to trust them. That trust is not easy to come by when you are being duped that the software was designed to help Scientific research and by the fact that it runs a BOINC Software it has certain inbuilt method to keep out unwanted individuals. I obviously was misinformed and misdirected. As stated earlier David on UTube emphasized Scientific research yet we had users before, now and no doubt in the future who used the software for personal use. BOINC Condones this. The idea is good and we are let to believe that we are protected to some extent yet almost everyday a professional Antivirus system states that beware this software is not trusted. I Joined because friends of my compatriots who I left behind come home sick and Died of Cancer. I have family members who have died of cancer and Muscular dystrophy. I am paying $200.00 a week plus for Electricity just to allow my machines for used for scientific research be it finding a cure for illnesses or finding Extraterrestrials in the Universe. I want a simnple software that I can trust to use for such purpose and we as users should have an input what we need. What we do not need is backing people who runs project for unknown reasons or use it for spam begging for donations to pay a university student to deliver A poster outside the campus or run a project that does nothing but issues credit. I do not understand how your complex hidden ecosystem fits in this debate.

The remainder (your 3%) that are discussing this will be sufficiently motivated to engage further, which they are doing and the new Governance structure will accommodate that.
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boboviz
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Message 63127 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 15:43:03 UTC - in response to Message 63125.  

Just a few days ago David was interviewed on UTube and unless I am blind and dumb, I could have sworn that he said that BOINC was created to help in Scientific Research. He never mentioned that anybody including Terrorist Organisation may use it for it is an Open In frastructure Software with no rules. If such thing happens it will not be the fault of the software for BOINC passed responsibility for using to the user neither BOINC or the University of Berkely is responsible for anything in the software or its documentation.


Uh. Very interesting point!
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Message 63128 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 16:39:14 UTC - in response to Message 63125.  
Last modified: 20 Jul 2015, 16:50:18 UTC

I wish to point out though that to date the BOINC System and that is the Software Component and Documemntation was controlled by one person. There was no clear process of review. There was no community involvement or need to find a consensus of the user. This was a Dictatorial system. Therefore the public was duped.

You can have it run by the greatest expert in the business (paid for by the American taxpayer) or else run by committee, sort of like the EU, if you prefer. There may not be much choice at this point, but I would take the expert if he is available.
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Message 63129 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 18:11:37 UTC
Last modified: 20 Jul 2015, 18:12:22 UTC

The only thing of importance is the tidbit that Christian said: So for most people directly involved in maintaining BOINC it is business as usual with the difference that now everything needs to be done in free time.

AKA: nothing has changed, nothing will change, the only thing that changed between then and now is that the three main developers no longer get paid for their time working on the BOINC code (no matter if that's client, server back-end, forums, Android or any additional software and add-ons).

For any of us mere users, everything we did for BOINC was already done in our free time.

It's of no use to continue asking questions, they will not be answered anyway. You will be ignored. The boinc_admin googlegroup listing is for the discussion of everything BOINC, not for PMC discussions, BOINC changes or god forbid, asking questions and expecting answers.

Nothing has changed, nothing will change. Shrug.
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Message 63130 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 20:44:49 UTC - in response to Message 62900.  
Last modified: 20 Jul 2015, 20:45:52 UTC


BOINC's funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation has ended


Meanwhile, over on the BBC:


Prof Stephen Hawking backs venture to listen for aliens

[...]

The £64m ($100m) initiative was launched by the Breakthrough Initiatives group at the Royal Society in London.

[...]

The public will be invited to participate in efforts to find a signal from another world through the SETI@home project.

[...]

Yuri Milner, a high tech US based-billionaire and founder of the initiative said ... "With Breakthrough Listen, we're committed to bringing the Silicon Valley approach to the search for intelligent life in the Universe. Our approach to data will be open and taking advantage of the problem-solving power of social networks."

[...]


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-33596271

Just to repeat, that's $100m headed somewhere in the direction of BOINC. I'm not sure if any of that will end up funding BOINC development. But it's fresh money, new momentum and will certainly add weight to any proposal for sponsorship initiated by the BOINC project itself.
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Message 63131 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 20:58:43 UTC - in response to Message 63130.  

Just to repeat, that's $100m headed somewhere in the direction of BOINC.

No, that's 100 million dollars divided over the next decade going to sources trying to find the answer if there is extraterrestrial life or not. Seti@Home is one of the beneficiaries, although we do not know in what form or way yet.

However Seti is not equal to BOINC. Seti just uses BOINC its framework. Just as the multitude of other projects use BOINC as their framework. If it were that simple to snoop off money, WCG could've asked IBM to send BOINC a million. So, please do not confuse BOINC with Seti and vice versa. They are two completely different entities.
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Message 63132 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 21:51:43 UTC - in response to Message 63131.  

Indeed - SETI@Home is one of many apps which run on the BOINC platform.

It follows that if the BOINC platform were to suffer misadventure, this would negatively impact this $100m initiative, which is using the SETI app and therefore depends on the continued operation of the BOINC platform.

So - guy has $100m riding on a community project that was recently defunded. What to do? Ignore it and risk $100m being derailed? Or spend a few % ensuring that it isn't?

WCG should have asked IBM to send BOINC a million. I think all the projects should do this, if they have a sponsor with the money. From the sponsor's point of view, it's good business sense to invest in the technology upon which their project depends.
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Message 63133 - Posted: 20 Jul 2015, 22:04:56 UTC - in response to Message 63132.  
Last modified: 21 Jul 2015, 0:32:20 UTC

It follows that if the BOINC platform were to suffer misadventure, this would negatively impact this $100m initiative, which is using the SETI app and therefore depends on the continued operation of the BOINC platform.

Even if development of BOINC were to come to a complete standstill tomorrow, that would not mean that Seti would no longer function. The present BOINC back-end used by Seti is stable, as are the majority of clients used by the public. Nothing runs via a central BOINC server, so there's really no impact on the projects were BOINC to drop off the face of the Earth. They can continue with what they have in place.

Edit, from David Anderson:
None of that money will go to BOINC, but a little of it might help SETI@home.
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