Move Boinc to SD card

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boboviz
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Message 75216 - Posted: 12 Jan 2017, 13:52:02 UTC

Over 2y ago, Ageless wrote:
No, at the moment the BOINC for Android app cannot use the SD card yet. That is slated for a future version.


And now?
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Profile Jord
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Message 75223 - Posted: 12 Jan 2017, 17:23:53 UTC - in response to Message 75216.  

Best ask in #1599, perhaps that then someone will think it worthy of their time.
Or as Christian says elsewhere:
...but it is up to you (as the one who wants to have it implemented) to find someone who is willing to spend time on this. BOINC is a community project now and has no dedicated developers anymore. So any request for a change or a new functionality is done in the spare time of volunteers which set their own priorities. If you want to bump priority you need to convince people that it is worth there while to do this or do it yourself and create a pull request.

Make sure to mention @denravonska, as he seems to be (one of?) the Android developer of choice at the moment.
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Message 75224 - Posted: 12 Jan 2017, 17:25:22 UTC - in response to Message 75216.  

Over 2y ago, Ageless wrote:
No, at the moment the BOINC for Android app cannot use the SD card yet. That is slated for a future version.


And now?


No new news on Android on the front lines.
Kathryn :o)
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boboviz
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Message 75261 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 7:46:10 UTC - in response to Message 75223.  

BOINC is a community project now and has no dedicated developers anymore. So any request for a change or a new functionality is done in the spare time of volunteers which set their own priorities. If you want to bump priority you need to convince people that it is worth there while to do this or do it yourself and create a pull request.
Make sure to mention @denravonska, as he seems to be (one of?) the Android developer of choice at the moment.


Thanks for the answer.
I'll wait for this feature
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ChristianB
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Message 75268 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 10:55:28 UTC

If I recall this correctly, the problem with moving BOINC to the CD card is that the external cards are mounted in a way that prevents executing binary applications. So in order to circumvent this one can use the SD card as data storage but the slot directories need to be on the phone itself (so binaries can be executed). Because those two things are separate filesystems and BOINC puts the slots where the data is one needs to break up this assumption first. The other thing is that this leads to a lot of copy operations as each time a task is started every file needs to be copied from SD card to internal memory. This can impact lifetime of internal memory and may be a showstopper for the whole SD card usage.
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boboviz
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Message 75273 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 11:25:13 UTC - in response to Message 75268.  

If I recall this correctly, the problem with moving BOINC to the CD card is that the external cards are mounted in a way that prevents executing binary applications. So in order to circumvent this one can use the SD card as data storage but the slot directories need to be on the phone itself (so binaries can be executed).


I move to my SD this apps:
Chess2 (chess game), Mahjong Titan, Nasa, Shazam, Wikipedia.
I think Chess2, Shazam and Mahjong are binary applications (and also Shazam).
I'm wrong?
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boboviz
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Message 75274 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 11:30:04 UTC - in response to Message 75268.  

The other thing is that this leads to a lot of copy operations as each time a task is started every file needs to be copied from SD card to internal memory. This can impact lifetime of internal memory and may be a showstopper for the whole SD card usage.


? I don't see any slowdown in my SD card apps (and NASA app is very big with a lot of photos and other things).
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ChristianB
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Message 75277 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 13:02:40 UTC - in response to Message 75273.  

I move to my SD this apps:
Chess2 (chess game), Mahjong Titan, Nasa, Shazam, Wikipedia.
I think Chess2, Shazam and Mahjong are binary applications (and also Shazam).
I'm wrong?

Maybe, I don't know. If they are Java Applications they are not binary applications so they can be moved. Maybe they only move the data part to SD and keep the executables on the internal memory?
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ChristianB
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Message 75278 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 13:06:09 UTC - in response to Message 75274.  

The other thing is that this leads to a lot of copy operations as each time a task is started every file needs to be copied from SD card to internal memory. This can impact lifetime of internal memory and may be a showstopper for the whole SD card usage.


? I don't see any slowdown in my SD card apps (and NASA app is very big with a lot of photos and other things).


I didn't mean performance. I meant lifetime expectancy because of a lot of write activity. Usually memory has a limit on write cycles. And also different behavior between apps, you can't compare an App that displays nice images and only updates once in a while with an application like BOINC which uses 100% of the CPU and does a lot more writes than those other applications.
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boboviz
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Message 75281 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 13:42:50 UTC - in response to Message 75277.  

Maybe they only move the data part to SD and keep the executables on the internal memory?


Maybe. I'd be happy to move the data of Ralph@Home (over 800 mb), for example....
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boboviz
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Message 75283 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 13:49:18 UTC - in response to Message 75278.  

I didn't mean performance. I meant lifetime expectancy because of a lot of write activity. Usually memory has a limit on write cycles. And also different behavior between apps, you can't compare an App that displays nice images and only updates once in a while with an application like BOINC which uses 100% of the CPU and does a lot more writes than those other applications.


Uh, i don't think. You might be right....
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Profile Jord
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Message 75288 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 14:51:27 UTC

For clarification, also for myself:
What is a binary file?
A binary file is a file stored in binary format. A binary file is computer-readable but not human-readable. All executable programs are stored in binary files, as are most numeric data files. In contrast, text files are stored in a form (usually ASCII) that is human-readable.
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ChristianB
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Message 75302 - Posted: 13 Jan 2017, 19:45:52 UTC

To clarify further. A lot of people (myself included) talk about binaries when they mean compiled executables. But from a technical perspective, Java class files are also binary files but they are not executable so they are not restricted and can be moved to SD cards on Android (because Android runs Java). Scripts are text files too but can be executed (through an interpreter) and so they can not be moved to SD cards on Android. Technical background: SD cards on Android are mounted in a way that prevents the Operating System from starting executable files (binary or text) that are stored on this devices. This was (and still is I think) a security feature of Android.
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Message boards : Android : Move Boinc to SD card

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