Posts by Stephen Wise

1) Message boards : BOINC Manager : My wish list (Message 8858)
Posted 18 Mar 2007 by Stephen Wise
Post:
I am running BOINC on a Macintosh. Here are a couple user interface suggestions:

1) In the menu bar there is a BOINC icon and when I click on it one of the options in the menu that pops up is "About BOINC Manager..." When I select that option, a dialog opens that reports the version number and offers a link to the main web page. I think the dialog should close when the user clicks on that link, in addition to closing when the user hits the "OK" button. Once you click on the link, the dialog disappears behind the web browser's window, and you can't get back to it by clicking on the menu bar icon again--that menu is inactive while the dialog is open. You have to hide the browser, or minify its window or something to bring the dialog back to where you can click on its "OK" button. That's a nuisance. I'm assuming that 99% of the time after jumping to the web site the user has no further use for the dialog. If the user wants to see the version number again while at the web site, they can always open the dialog again.

2) BOINC does not really need to be represented in the Dock. Dock space is precious, and BOINC is a "set it and forget it" application--it can be set to do its thing while the computer is otherwise inactive, and in that mode it gets out of the way immediately when the user starts to work. I can't speak for other users, but for my part I don't need to open BOINC Manager every three minutes to check whether the space aliens are sending me private messages. (Besides that, if they are not smart enough to post directly to my occipital cortex, I'm not interested in making their acquaintance. ;) So I think BOINC Manager should have a preference option to stay out of the Dock. The aforesaid icon in the menu bar serves perfectly well to open/switch to the application. If not appearing in the Dock torpedoes the application's menu bar (due to a quirk in OS X), the functionality of the menu bar should be transfered to buttons within the window.
2) Message boards : BOINC Manager : 5.8.15 chained to Dock? (Message 8853)
Posted 18 Mar 2007 by Stephen Wise
Post:
I have upgraded from 5.4.9 to 5.8.15, running under Mac OS 10.4.9. Under the older version I was able to remove BOINC Manager from the Dock via the utility Dockless, but that doesn't seem to work any more with the new version. I tried changing the permissions from "Read only" to "Read and Write" (except for World) but it didn't help. Does anyone know if there is a way to get this new version out of the Dock?

3) Message boards : Web interfaces : Web site deficiencies (Message 8836)
Posted 17 Mar 2007 by Stephen Wise
Post:
Perhaps this is not the right place to report deficiencies in the web site as opposed to the web interfaces; if so, please let me know the right place.

My Mac crashed shortly after I updated it to 10.4.9, at a time when BOINC was the only active application, so it occurred to me that it might be time to update that software. So I went to the main web site. Here is what I found:

1) No instructions about updating. (Not in the ReadMe file of my current version either.)

2) The menu item "About BOINC Manager" reports that it is version 5.4.9, while the web site download page offers BOINC 5.8.15. Are those two numbers comparable? Is BOINC the same as BOINC Manager, or is BOINC the underlying engine and BOINC Manager the user interface?

3) No dates on the version history page. Knowing the dates tells me whether the current version is newer than what I have. I did find dates buried more deeply, in the "version details" via the "all versions" page.

4) No contact addresses, like a webmaster to report these issues to. Perhaps spam is to blame for that.

Besides that, when a recommended update becomes available shouldn't users get an e-mail notification? Or a "check for updates" button in the application? Or automatic updating?




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