Posts by Chinook

1) Message boards : BOINC client : Crunching vs. CPU curiosity? (Message 1484) Posted 3 Dec 2005 by Chinook Post: et al, (this actually leads somewhere) Well, I got a real history lesson plus out of this post as a bonus :-) Actually, I'm a retired SE that right after school and the military began work at the tail end of the IBM unit record equipment (do you remember programming as wiring boards :-). Having been on the software end since IBM 360 assembler, I certainly don't have the in-depth hardware knowledge that you-all seem to have. The first PCs I worked with were the original IBM PCs (before Windows 95) and that was just to develop a network software framework between them and HP3000 hosts. Later, of course, I became more and more involved with PC software because PCs were all the rage with "power to the people." Alas, the mid-range HP3000s, Decs and others I can't remember the names of went away in favor of PCs, server clusters and the ultimate server cluster the super computer. Meanwhile, I developed for Windows PCs and became more and more disenchanted with what there was to work with. I really didn't have an opportunity to work with Apple systems and I'm not convinced I missed much in the "Clasic" days. However, the end of last year I gave up the ghost and began learning OS X software development. I already knew a little about Unix so it wasn't a completely fresh start, but I'm actually enjoying keeping my head busy again. "Different folks, different strokes," but my bag is the intuitive Unix foundation, the logical and organized ObjC/Cocoa development environment and the superior OS X GUI doesn't upset me :-) I could, of course, easily adapt to the Linux environment sans a superior GUI, but I'm happy for now. Personally, though, I could never go back to anything MS. Software has three stages; the geeks (no disrespect - they're the pioneers), the practical SEs, then the suits who kill it off. To me personally, MS started with the suits and became a monopoly because they only gave lip service to software piracy until they were a monopoly (every pirated MS software package was a lost sale to a competitor). With most suits, the ends justify the means. Wherever Apple goes with their hardware, I'll probably keep working at their software because I enjoy it. Which, if I get far enough along, might entail helping some of these "worthy" projects with their software in addition to just providing more hardware. Did I get all the way back to BOINC? 8<))) Lee C
2) Message boards : BOINC client : Crunching vs. CPU curiosity? (Message 1415) Posted 1 Dec 2005 by Chinook Post: Chinook, I don't work for Einstein, my computer crunches solely Einstein, and I've been working on the messageboards there quite a bit. The most recent line of code I've written was in 1983, when I was familiarizing myself with the C64, after having been recruited by Commodore. By "new processors", are you referring to the Intel x86 that Apple is moving to, or is there another step inbetween? The move to x86 will mean that Apple will have to come out of the closet with the x86 port of their OS, should make things Verrry Interesting. I've nothing bad to say about Macs - one of my best friends is a Mac guy, and despite that, I still like him. Heck, my own brother has turned traitor, er... gone over to the Dark Side, er... gone back to using both platforms, I just pray that it's not a genetic flaw. ;-0 OK :-))) To me arguing about the relative merits of Windows vs. OS X is like arguing about the relative merits of Basic vs. ObjC. In my experience neither party will budge. As far as Apple "coming out" they already have - at least as far as the development community. I've heard they have had an X86 port for at least a couple years now. Just my guess, but you're not going to see OS X on just any ol hardware ;') BOT: The R@H software must be optimized for X86 Lee C "Give me *nix or give me a burger flipping job"
3) Message boards : BOINC client : Crunching vs. CPU curiosity? (Message 1414) Posted 1 Dec 2005 by Chinook Post: Chinook, I don't work for Einstein, my computer crunches solely Einstein, and I've been working on the messageboards there quite a bit. The most recent line of code I've written was in 1983, when I was familiarizing myself with the C64, after having been recruited by Commodore. By "new processors", are you referring to the Intel x86 that Apple is moving to, or is there another step inbetween? The move to x86 will mean that Apple will have to come out of the closet with the x86 port of their OS, should make things Verrry Interesting. I've nothing bad to say about Macs - one of my best friends is a Mac guy, and despite that, I still like him. Heck, my own brother has turned traitor, er... gone over to the Dark Side, er... gone back to using both platforms, I just pray that it's not a genetic flaw. ;-0
4) Message boards : BOINC client : Crunching vs. CPU curiosity? (Message 1411) Posted 1 Dec 2005 by Chinook Post: Thanks Michael, At least I know I'm not just making things up now. I won't say anything bad about PCs, but I've never looked back since moved to Mac software development last year :-) I'm already looking at the new processors due out sometime next year and it's not going to affect my ObjC/Cocoa development much, but what is it going to do to your effort? Lee C "Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing." -- Redd Foxx
5) Message boards : BOINC client : Crunching vs. CPU curiosity? (Message 1407) Posted 1 Dec 2005 by Chinook Post: I haven't noticed a better place for a cross-project inquiry and I'm bored with an ObjC problem, so if you don't have a few minutes to waste then ignore this :-) I just started running BOINC a week ago with three project accounts. I run them on both my dual 2.5 PMac G5 2GB DDR SDRAM (OS 10.4.3) and Windows PC x86 15,2,4 2519Mhz 1GB RAM (XP). Both processors are used on the Mac so there are two projects active at a time and since the PC has only one processor only one project is active at a time. I do all my work on the Mac and have BOINC set to Run Always. The PC is hardly ever used other than the BOINC projects. A very unscientific observance of the CPU Time columns on each host reveals the following: 1) CP projects take forever on either computer so no HA conclusion 2) E@H projects complete significantly faster on my Mac by a factor of .6+/- 3) R@H projects complete somewhat faster on the PC by a factor of .8+ I'm, of course, assuming that like account project work units are roughly the same size regardless of host. Could it be that for a given project either the type of calculations, or project software, is better suited for one computer or the other? Lee C "The early bird may get the worm but the second mouse gets the cheese!" - Willie Nelson
6) Message boards : BOINC client : Shutdown issue? (Message 1400) Posted 1 Dec 2005 by Chinook Post: not sure about macs, but on windows i run boinc as a service, and use a shutdown script " net stop boinc " (using gpedit.msc) and never have any problems, this basically tells windows, when windows is told to shutdown/restart, to stop the boinc service before actually shutting down, only when the script completes (and the service is stopped, along with all science apps) does windows shutdown no idea how to do this for non-service installs, or how to do either on a mac Thanks for the reply Lee Carre, I know how to set things up either as a GUI or Unix CLI. I chose the GUI so I could see what's going on easier when I get bored :-) Whether the issue I noted would have occurred with a CLI setup I don't know. It did occur with the GUI and I thought it might bear looking into. However, as I noted, there was an upgrade so I installed it and am watching to see if the issue shows up again. Lee C (Unix is user friendly - it's just picky about it's friends.)
7) Message boards : BOINC client : Shutdown issue? (Message 1326) Posted 30 Nov 2005 by Chinook Post: Thanks again Bill, Right after my evening clone was a good time, so I downloaded and installed the new version and all seems to be running well on my Mac. As long as a CP unit is not active I'll continue just shutting down to see if the "computation error" shows up again. Now I'll put the new version up on the clunky ol windoze PC also :-) Lee C
8) Message boards : BOINC client : Shutdown issue? (Message 1322) Posted 30 Nov 2005 by Chinook Post: Thanks for the reply Bill, Helpful in one important way - having just installed BOINC a week ago I had not looked for a newer version yet. My version seems to be 5.2.5 and the latest download is noted as 5.2.13. So I suppose I should upgrade. Do the BOINC packages handle upgrades without destroying wip?? Lee C
9) Message boards : BOINC client : Shutdown issue? (Message 1298) Posted 29 Nov 2005 by Chinook Post: Dual 2.5 PMac G5 running Tiger (10.4.3). Most of the time I have BOINC set to "Run Always" because it doesn't usually noticeably slow down my other work (even though it uses both processors). Each day I shut down BOINC in the evening while I clone my working volume to an external HD. I use "Quit BOINC" from the menu bar. Last evening I did so and when I started back up I saw that both projects that had been active at shutdown (E@H and R@H) were flagged "computational error." I had not seen this in the previous week I've been running BOINC. I don't believe in the word "fluke" so my shutdown must have caught BOINC at an inopportune time and I have not tried to recreate the issue because I don't like wasting work. My intended workaround is to suspend BOINC before shutting down. Is this something that bears looking into?? Because of the issue I checked out my system as thoroughly as I could (DU and DW) and found no file system or permissions problems. Neither do I notice anything in the Console logs that I recognize as being applicable. I'm also running BOINC projects under the same account on an XP PC on my LAN which was just gathering dust otherwise. I always suspend then shutdown BOINC on the windoze platform (for obvious reasons). Lee C

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