I tried to login to this Forum using my Boinc/Seti Account Key but was told:

We have no account with the key...

I tried to login to this Forum using my Boinc/Seti e-mail & password but was told that:

No account found with email address...

I can understand not being able to use my Boinc/Seti Account Key since there may be duplicate account keys generated across projects, but my e-mail and password should be unique.

I don't understand why I was required to create another account to post to this website. Why not use my email address and password created when setting up a Boinc project?

---

I don't understand why I was required to create another account to post to this website. Why not use my email address and password created when setting up a Boinc project?

How? Do you want every project to send each other everybody's email address and passwords? Not very secure...

And BOINC is not SETI and SETI is not BOINC. They both come from the same place, UCB, but SETI is a project and BOINC is a framework for supporting multiple projects. If BOINC gave SETI "special privileges", the other projects would rightfully complain.

---

How? Do you want every project to send each other everybody's email address and passwords? Not very secure...

No, but how about using the Cross-project ID ?

Under account info, at the bottom of the page, Cross-project ID is listed. The Cross-project ID "is a unique identifier across multiple projects. Accounts with the same email address on different projects will have the same cross-project identifier (as long as at least one computer is attached to both accounts)." So could be used as login info for the BOINC website.

Not very secure...

Neither is the sending of passwords without encryption, but this appears to be the standard for BOINC across projects.

---

No, but how about using the Cross-project ID ?

Okay, I'm totally lost by what you're asking. First, each project creates their own CPID when you join. Those are (hopefully, and eventually) "linked up" by the BOINC client on your computer, changing later ones to match the earliest signup date.

Do you want this sent just to the BOINC website such that you have to go find this large random number to be able to signin here, rather than having to take a couple of minutes to create an account using your email address and password? Should the CPID be sent to _every_ project, every time it's changed, so that you will already have an account everywhere, in case you want to sign up there someday?

While BOINC is not a "project", you will note that these boards are the same basic format, running on the same code, as all the other 'standard' project boards. You even have credit information under your name, although BOINC itself doesn't issue credits, and if you look at your account data, there is a field for "your computers", which is pointless as you don't attach anything here. That's because BOINC is just using the same server software for these boards as SETI, Einstein, Rosetta, and all the others.

The _only_ purpose for these boards is to provide support for "general BOINC issues" that aren't related to a specific project. Traffic is very, very low compared to the SETI boards. It really just isn't worth the effort to make these very specialized boards a separate code stream from the 'standard' one.

---

[quote]No, but how about using the Cross-project ID ?

Okay, I'm totally lost by what you're asking.

Why not use the Cross-project ID to login?

Is that plain enough?

Do you want this sent just to the BOINC website such that you have to go find this large random number to be able to signin here, ]

This large random number is easily accessed by going to the bottom of the page of your account info.

rather than having to take a couple of minutes to create an account using your email address and password?

You still have not addressed the security concerns of sending passwords as clear text...

Should the CPID be sent to _every_ project, every time it's changed, so that you will already have an account everywhere, in case you want to sign up there someday?

No, I was not explicitly or implicitly making that suggestion. You seem to have great difficulty understanding what I am saying. Is English a second language? If so, I can try to compose my concerns in another language.

---

post,

You have just crossed the line from complaint to insult.

I think that an apology to Bill is in order. If that is beyond your capabilities, then don't be surprised if you are ignored from now on.

BTW, Bill is probably the most hard-working person on this helpboard.

---

"The arc of history is long, but it bends toward Justice"

The reason CPID cannot be used is that it is a published value. It is used in XML stats along with your account name. So, I could "steal" your identity if this was used.

Security is hard, and BOINC is not as secure as it could be, but, has been threading the narrow space between convenience and security. As major issues are found, new measures are imposed.

There is work underway to simplify the cross-project issues but we are not there yet ...

---

I will take one more stab at this. We'll see if I have the correct understanding of what post is asking for.

The software at every project must be changed, so that when anyone registers for that project, the newly-created CPID should be sent to the BOINC webserver, along with the username. The BOINC webserver, rather than having the exact same software as every other project, should have it's own, different version, that receives a CPID from a project and instantly creates an account. (Must be real-time, as someone could attach at SETI then immediately come here; which also means retry capability must be built in, and handshaking and verification, in case these boards are down at the moment someone registers elsewhere.)

The BOINC servers obviously will need to be expanded immensely to deal with this; after all, in the five months these boards have existed, post is only the 623rd person to register here - SETI a couple of weeks ago was registering 20,000 people per DAY. So figure instead of 600+ accounts, BOINC needs to store somewhere around a half-million, the total number of users at all projects.

Now, since post won't want to have a _different_ account here for each project he registers for, we need to tie the different CPIDs together somehow. We can't just use the first one that will _eventually_ be the "synced" CPID, because he may have a problem right after joining his third project, and he'll want to use the CPID from that project to come here. Method 1) We can't do it by screenname, because there could easily be seven "post"s, or 70. So we send not only the screenname, but the email address. We have to allow the person with this email address to login here using _any_ CPID they have ever been assigned. Method 2) When a CPID is changed, syncing up on the BOINC Client, we have to change the BOINC Client software to notify not only the project that it's changed, but also send some kind of signal back to these boards. More network traffic, but means we can then eliminate the second (or fifth) CPID from post's records, hoping he hasn't written it down somewhere or stored it in a file. Um - if he HAS saved it somewhere, he'll want to still be able to use it, so Method 2 is probably out. We'll have to use Method 1, any user can have any number of passwords, which are the PUBLICLY AVAILABLE CPIDs. Oh, since the CPIDs _are_ public, we should probably add a user-changeable password...

To summarize. Design and create a new version of the BOINC Server-side software to maintain in parallel with the "base". Modify the "base" to have a new feature. Possibly modify BOINC Client to have a new feature. Upgrade the BOINC server's account capacity by a factor of somewhere around 500 to 1000. Upgrade the BOINC server's network bandwidth by some unknown amount.

No problem at all, this will take care of it - post won't have to spend 2 minutes creating an account here to be able to post!

Unless of course I have totally misunderstood, given my limited English skills...

---