BOINC seems to make a rather dumb assumption that it should use disk space, for data, in the same partition in which it was installed. This can be a particularly nasty problem when running BOINC as a service, in Linux, where the code is installed in a small partition so as to limit possible corruption to other services or the OS itself. The user should be able to explicitly set where BOINC data should reside, i.e. what mount point or partition to use for data. If such a setting exists, I was unable to find it using the BOINC manager. Is there some other way to control where BOINC data should reside?

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Marc Chamberlin

Computers: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the user Marc.
His mission: to explore strange new hardware. To seek out new software and new applications.
To boldly go where no Marc has gone before!

There IS an option for this, and it IS in the install process.
At least in the Berkeley version. If you're using something from a repository, you need to talk to the maintainers about it.

Un-install, re-install, and this time look at about the 3rd screen.
There is an Advanced button on it, which takes you to an extra step where you can, indeed, choose the location, of both the programs part, and of the data part. Plus a few other things.

This can be a particularly nasty problem when running BOINC as a service, in Linux, where the code is installed in a small partition so as to limit possible corruption to other services or the OS itself.

In Windows the path can be set as Les has posted, whereas in Linux the path is wherever you start the install script, and then /var/lib/boinc/ (or something similar).

So if you have the installer on your smallest partition and start it there, BOINC will be installed to that partition. If you move it to your largest partition and start it there, it will be installed on the largest partition.

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Well I guess I am not making myself clear on this issue... and yes I am working with a Linux installation, NOT Windows so there is no GUI installer, just a shell script to install BOINC. And yes I understand that the way the install script works, is that it sets up the BOINC architecture/environment so that both the executable code and the data code reside in the same directory. And that is just my point and the issue! For most users this is probably fine and they would not care so much, but this is dangerous from the perspective of reliability. One should be able to separate the data space from the code space and place these on separate partitions and/or on separate disk drives. This minimizes the possibility that data corruption, running out of data space, a drive failure, etc will impact either the BOINC service itself or other services, and/or stop the the OS itself.

Architecting software so as to be able to separate data from code, in a file system, has always been taught as a means of making a system more reliable, in all the computer science classes I have ever had. If this is not possible for the Linux installation, then why has this "best practice" been abandoned?

Marc..

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Marc Chamberlin

Computers: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the user Marc.
His mission: to explore strange new hardware. To seek out new software and new applications.
To boldly go where no Marc has gone before!

Ok Thanks! I see how to set up a separate data directory for BOINC now. Apparently one must create a separate user "boinc" and attach it to a "home" or working directory for data. The executables can then be installed in the usual places where application binaries generally go. This also requires some manual editing of the daemon script. (and no, SuSE Linux does not supply BOINC as part of it's distro packages...)

You are correct in stating that this approach just kicked the problem of separating data from code down the road to the Linux distro installers. And Linux is a mess in this regards since there is no real "established" way of installing stuff and/or purpose behind many of the "standard" directories. And the poor user does not have a clue, for all the various applications and system services, as to how directories should be mounted and partitions created so as to make Linux more robust and reliable. In other words, an installer cannot guarantee that the user will mount /home or /var or /var/lib/boinc for that matter on a separate partition so as to separate data from code.

IMHO a better approach would have been to design the BOINC manager/client in such a way as to easily allow the user to define (and even change/move) where data is to be placed, after installation, not during the installation and setup of BOINC itself. (default data location(s) could be pre-set up for really naive users) Perhaps even on a per project basis. That would have given both installers and users a great deal more flexibility in managing their own systems.

Marc..

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Marc Chamberlin

Computers: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the user Marc.
His mission: to explore strange new hardware. To seek out new software and new applications.
To boldly go where no Marc has gone before!

Still, you can fill out a Trac ticket feature request or put your sugestion in the wish list thread.

Hmmmm I am not able to figure out how to supply a Trac ticket, or where the wish list thread is. Can you provide me with links? Thanks...

Marc...

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Marc Chamberlin

Computers: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the user Marc.
His mission: to explore strange new hardware. To seek out new software and new applications.
To boldly go where no Marc has gone before!

Here's a link to the Trac page.

Where? ;-)

Here's a link to the Trac page. Start with the Login link on that page because you have to first establish an account. After you login to your account you'll see a link to enter a new ticket.

Account creation on Trac is disabled to counter the spammers.
You will now have to email David Anderson to get an account. See this post of mine for his email address.

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