Need input from both Horde and Commandos regarding future of projects

There has been some discussion in the IRC channel about where the team stands now that many members are leaving FAH. However, we are seeing some members not move to other projects or are feeling a bit flooded with the options available to them. So, it has been suggested and re-affirmed the need for an official non-FAH project for those wanting to still feel part of the team they are used to while still leaving room for those wanting to contribute elsewhere to continue using the Commandos style mentality.

First thing on the list is to eliminate the usage of [H]orde versus Commandos. Some of the discussion has led us to believe this is a good time to stop making the team feel divided when there are actually many users whom support both groups.

Second, we need to decide on a project outside of FAH to be the official team project to support for those whom are fed up with FAH. In the past WCG had been a pretty popular favorite and probably has our largest number of active members. However, this would be a good time for people to state their thoughts.

Third, most projects will not let us merge teams together. So the headache we have felt by having multiple team names due to unofficial teams being created can not be avoided. Creating a whole new team name would mean most contributions from the past would not be fully represented in the new team and there is a lot of people whom aren't comfortable with starting over with a clean slate. So, by choosing a set team as the go to project, this will make things easier for those not interested in bouncing between the 80 or so other projects that are available.

Fourth, we do have a lot of information that bounces between a couple threads. I know some people don't want to learn a whole new process but there are many of us willing to walk you through it. BOINC isn't as tough as it looks but does take a small learning curve to maximize each unique system. I think members of [H] can handle that. If a different project is chosen, we may have a bigger learning curve as we don't have as much focus elsewhere.

Last, it was brought up about a stats page. We don't really need to host our own in order to compare where we are. There are plenty of sites already doing that for us. BOINCStas and Free-DC have lots of available information. Most projects (if not all) also have stats available breaking things down. So, if we decide on a project, links can be posted for easy reference.

So, what does everyone think? There is no wrong answer or opinion. I would like people to chime in because that is the only way we hear the voices with concerns or opinions. I don't even care if it was something you have stated a thousand times. Please add any additional thoughts that may need considered too.

I think sticking to DC-Vault and Formula BOINC is the way to go. I enjoy multiple projects and the challenge each presents and will never give myself to solely one project ever again.

Boinc is certainly a whole different animal, and for a new user it's very confusing not only for the client but also the terminology.

There may be a Guide under the DC Guides subfolder but when people start throwing around terms like DC-Vault, formula boinc, WCG, distributed .net, etc understanding what they are and how they all link together is confusing.

I think that a couple of solid projects should be the main focus for the team. Coming from F@H the lack of polish which some of the BOINC projects are a bit off putting. I've never had to worry about if the project I wanted to connect to supported my CPU, GPU, OS, had enough work available, if the client properly checkpointed, when the stats updates occurred, etc. I'd say that sticking to recommending a couple of starter projects that are well supported and eliminate most of the oddities.

If I were trying to write a guide for a new user I can tell you right away that you would want to focus on using Boincstats. Their site seems to be better than free-dc.org (No random pages where half of the links don't work) and they have the BAM! client. I decided to sign up with Rosetta at first but it's very obvious that anyone folding for H will want to just start with BAM! and work from there. (Multiple projects and/or multiple computers) Also it seems that WCG doesn't support special characters so if you're setting your password for BAM! a disclaimer for that should certainly be included.

By picking something like WCG and Milkyway (or SIMAP or Primegrid) and giving them official status with dedicated threads it can help easy new members into projects they can run no matter what configuration they have. I certainly agree that more than one should be picked simply to show the diversity of BOINC and how each it is to run different projects and compete in the different challenges.

One of the things that I can definitely say which attracted me to folding for [H] in the first place was the amount of activity in the forums, the amount of users to compete against, and the overall progress that the team made. On one of my old teams I was the #1 folder (still am) and there were only a handful of members and the forums were dead silent. Without anyone to compete against around my level and the fact that by myself the only direction the team was heading was down the ranks it makes it feel like there is little point in trying. Those are some tough things to overcome. Having the challenges and showing that we are in fact banding together and as a group we are taking other teams out and going up is a huge boost for others to jump on the bandwagon. Especially if we have easy to follow directions, and the new users get help from the more experienced, then they can turn around and help other new users get setup. It's more engaging when you just did the same thing yourself and can help someone else get set up so we can crush the competition.


Long post is long but just trying to give some of the long time members an idea of what a new user may think if they are on the fence about joining our team. I also think if we get this sorted and start gaining traction that we should rotate F@H and BOINC on the front page. F@H is definitely still important for the people who would like to use it, but I would think it's more attractive for a new user to see a lot of positive activity for the project they want to join.


@Dookey: Yes a couple of projects that fall under Vault and Formula BOINC without the person even having to know they are contributing to them. I think Formula BOINC should really be the focus of what challenge to push as it is a long ongoing challenge and new users might not be interested in trying to switch every week to the next mini challenge. It would be interesting if inside of the team say two projects happen to be around the same amount of points and everyone could play tug of war with each other over which project is #1 on our team.

I think our "official" project should follow in the same vein as FAH with a primary focus on medical research. WCG is the most logical choice under that scenario.

bman212121, I like that last idea and may even think something up for it some time. As far as DC-Vault vs Formula-BOINC, they are both unique in their own ways. I think new members would have an easier time with Formula-BOINC because it is one client to use and is easy to attach to multiple projects. However, you also start over each year. Some people like the idea of holding that position they earned as if their past contributions still mattered. That is where DC-Vault shines. It is an ongoing never ending always evolving (well... sometimes it is a bit slow), but in the end your points are always there. However, the strength of Formula-BOINC only being one client still comes with a huge flaw. It admits almost (not all but close) all of the BOINC projects. Even the ones that have lots of problems and hiccups. DC-Vault typically has good solid projects compared to most. Both of those promote teams expanding beyond one project. This is the first year we have actually really looked at Formula-Boinc, so it is a new concept for many of us.

Anyways, good input so far. Keep the ideas and opinions coming peeps.

Gilthanis said:

bman212121, I like that last idea and may even think something up for it some time. As far as DC-Vault vs Formula-BOINC, they are both unique in their own ways. I think new members would have an easier time with Formula-BOINC because it is one client to use and is easy to attach to multiple projects. However, you also start over each year. Some people like the idea of holding that position they earned as if their past contributions still mattered. That is where DC-Vault shines. It is an ongoing never ending always evolving (well... sometimes it is a bit slow), but in the end your points are always there. However, the strength of Formula-BOINC only being one client still comes with a huge flaw. It admits almost (not all but close) all of the BOINC projects. Even the ones that have lots of problems and hiccups. DC-Vault typically has good solid projects compared to most. Both of those promote teams expanding beyond one project. This is the first year we have actually really looked at Formula-Boinc, so it is a new concept for many of us.

Anyways, good input so far. Keep the ideas and opinions coming peeps.

Click to expand...

See from my perspective I see formula boinc as just a yearly challenge and the DC-Vault / Boincstats page as the overall progress that is the same way as F@H is. Formula boinc = Chimp challenge and DC-Vault = F@H stats. At least that's how I see it.

brycejones, WCG fits the [H]ard for [H]umanity slogan we already use since they only accept humanitarian based projects. I think you are right that it is a good fit in general. They also tend to have a hand full of different sciences to pick from.

The other question though goes to whether we want to go as far as saying official CPU, GPU, everything, or what project. Since people clearly have GPU's and WCG currently does not have nor do they have a project in the pipeline with GPU in mind. However, I vote No to making it multi official like that for simplicity. People wanting to run GPU as well could just join us at the other projects as it is.

bman212121 said:

See from my perspective I see formula boinc as just a yearly challenge and the DC-Vault / Boincstats page as the overall progress that is the same way as F@H is. Formula boinc = Chimp challenge and DC-Vault = F@H stats. At least that's how I see it.

Click to expand...

Well...when it comes to the over all team then, DC-Vault should win out because it includes FAH...

Gilthanis said:

Well...when it comes to the over all team then, DC-Vault should win out because it includes FAH...

Click to expand...

And that just makes it even more confusing lol... So BOINC is it's own part, distributed.net is it's own but that and WCG can both fall under BOINC. Then all of the above falls under the vault? That's where a nice graphic could be handy in figuring out what goes with what...


EDIT: So this is the overall vault ranking?

http://www.dc-vault.com/showteam.php?team=98

This seems a bit silly to me because there is really no difference in point values between being #1 and being #100. I get that it's probably because it's out of like 100,000 teams but one person with a single 24/7 rig can probably put up enough points to be ranked in the top 500 or better.

brycejones said:

I think our "official" project should follow in the same vein as FAH with a primary focus on medical research. WCG is the most logical choice under that scenario.

Click to expand...

I do agree with the medical research part. I was thinking that WCG supported GPUs but I guess it doesn't. The biggest problem that I'm seeing is that it's actually impossible to find a medical project that caters to everyone. GPUGRID doesn't appear to support AMD Cards or macs, and SIMAP doesn't support GPUs either. I think at least one of the official projects should cover Windows / Linux / Mac, X86/x64 / Nvidia / AMD. It may have to be in a different field though.

You most likely will have to select a few projects to cover all hardware. I personally have quite a bit of fun switching around but I would have no problem dedicating some of my resources to a team project and basically do that now with the DC Vault and Formula Boinc.

And I personally feel that saying Boinc has a slight learning curve is a gross understatement. Boinc and it's magnitude of projects and all of there quirks, configs etc. can be mind boggling especially to an old fart such as myself. But once you start to learn it it can be quite a bit of fun. I do believe we should start individual project topics though rather than the way it is set up now finding info can be tough in a 30 page 100 page thread.

I believe team projects would be good for newcomers to the Boinc game it gives them something easy to set up and to start with where they can feel they are able to contribute and start learning the Boinc quirks if the wish or just stay with a team project. As I said before I think you are going to need several to cover all hardware and they should be established projects that have few and far between problems.

I am for using DC Vault as a team project due to the fact it has FAH included in it and I am a strong supporter of us being 1 team. It also suppors all forms of hardware and has mostley established projects.

bman212121 said:

http://www.dc-vault.com/showteam.php?team=98

This seems a bit silly to me because there is really no difference in point values between being #1 and being #100. I get that it's probably because it's out of like 100,000 teams but one person with a single 24/7 rig can probably put up enough points to be ranked in the top 500 or better.

Click to expand...

This is allot tougher than you are imagining, When I was running FAH I was the #1 point producer for quite a while then brilong and Mtnduey came along and I was still #3 I believe I am currently #147 based on recent avg credit in Boinc and I have added quite a bit of hardware since the FAH days, so there are allot of very heavy hitters out there. We have been #5 in the DC vault for most of the time I have been crunching for the [H]. Formula Boinc has been a bit easier but that is only because we are not in the top teer yet, which we will be next year and it is going to be allot tougher then.

My personal favorite for team stats is this one http://stats.free-dc.org/stats.php?page=userteamcomb&proj=&team=[H]ard|OCP&sort=today Ooops and this one http://stats.free-dc.org/stats.php?page=userteamcomb&proj=&team=HardOCP&sort=today

Grandpa_01 said:

This is allot tougher than you are imagining, When I was running FAH I was the #1 point producer for quite a while then brilong and Mtnduey came along and I was still #3 I believe I am currently #147 based on recent avg credit in Boinc and I have added quite a bit of hardware since the FAH days, so there are allot of very heavy hitters out there. We have been #5 in the DC vault for most of the time I have been crunching for the [H]. Formula Boinc has been a bit easier but that is only because we are not in the top teer yet, which we will be next year and it is going to be allot tougher then.

My personal favorite for team stats is this one http://stats.free-dc.org/stats.php?page=userteamcomb&proj=&team=[H]ard|OCP&sort=today Ooops and this one http://stats.free-dc.org/stats.php?page=userteamcomb&proj=&team=HardOCP&sort=today

Click to expand...

Yea but that's kind of what I'm saying. The amount of resources it required you to use to put yourself at the top of F@H isn't even close to say the amount needed for yoyo@home. You could be a top 40 team with only 10M points where the #1 team has 800M. Yet the difference is something like 10K points versus 9,800 points. In 5 days you racked up a million points. So in less than 2 months you alone could take a team from no points to like 9,800 points in that category.

http://stats.distributed.net/team/tlist.php?project_id=28&low=1&limit=100

I do kind of see where everyone who is actually looking for positions it all in that same range, but I think the way the stats are setup it's more important to just be #10 in everything and make 1/4 of the points the top two teams are than making a huge amount of points under one project.

It actually funny / sad to look up some of the stats. Xtremesystems only gets docked 4 points in F@H for making 2.2B to our 43B. Dutch power cows gets docked 5.7 points for making 1.4B

The purpose of DC Vault is to help out some of the lesser projects thus the more popular a project is the less points there is per position and 10,000 = #1 lets say there are 10,000 teams folding FAH so each position = 1 point so since [H] is the number 1 team it gets 10,000 points and EVGA is #2 it would get 9999 points. Now lets say another project only had 100 teams crunching it the #1 team would get 10,000 points the #2 team would get 9900 what it does is encourage people to run the less popular projects by rewarding more points per position http://www.dc-vault.com/showcat.php?by=6&cat=2&order=desc If you look at what the goal of the DC Vault is it makes more sense.
http://digik-oz.nl/dcVaultStats.aspx?team=[H]ardOCP

I just hope y'all sort it out so I can get excited about contributing again.

FAH just left such a bad taste in my mouth, I'm kind of going to have to be spoon fed a new project I'm afraid.

When I was a teenager, I started distributed computing with SETI and United Devices on the home computer with family-paid electricity. Afterwards I had different focus (and also a low paid first job), and it took me some years to be back to DC with PS3 and laptop, wanting to contribute to projects that can on the long term make a difference in people's health, and I ended up with FAH / Team 51.

Later, I found myself being financially able to purchase some dedicated hardware, and I switched to [H] because of the activity on the forum, quality of DC Guides, quality of member's answers, team competition (within the team / with our EVGA fellows) and entertaining HDCOM threads. At this time, I was primarily seeing DC Commandos as a gathering of members who wanted to make good use of non-BA class hardware, and I kept in mind it would be worth digging in their forum threads when my hardware stop qualifying for BA. But basically, for me DC Commandos were members of the team, not a different team, they just had a special signature like other have (4P Mafia and so on).

When the (last) PG PR fiasco happened, I continued folding BA/Core_17 for some time, but decided to give a try to BOINC because I missed the feeling of checking daily what's on with the team, and it's not so fun to mow in FAH team members who do not compete.

This for the my DC past, what about my vision for the future ? In my opinion, [H]ard for [H]umanity still summarizes well the kind of donation I have in mind : I have no used company Teslas , no borged hardware, so I basically fold/crunch with hardware and electricity I pay for, making careful calculations before each investment to stay on budget. In my opinion, a humanitarian project shall be considered by the team when :

1/ the software used for calculations is considered scientifically valuable by publishing scientists other than the ones of the project, so the output has a chance to be scientifically valuable and used

2/ our assessment of the project viability is good eg we really think there will be some good use of our resources and it will yield at some point either some drugs candidates (like WCG) or some peer reviewed papers (like FAH or GPUGRID) used by other researchers .

I think it is pointless to dedicate my resources to some projects whose crappy HTML 1.0 webpage and never updated forum somehow suggest funding issues and/or lack of admin involvement, yielding a risk to be retired before getting results. Docking is retired, SIMAP will go internal...

3/ we see continuous software development to use latest technologies and maximise contribution of our existing hardware : I am talking AVX, CUDA 6... (and also, it's cool to be cutting edge)

4/ it can sustain enough work for all the teams involved

5/ you can see your contribution in each paper (today I think only GPUGRID does this with per-paper badge, and ocores have the potential to do it thanks to per-frame statistics). I think it's pretty important to be able to show to family and friends who think DC is useless or think cryptocurrencies are better, that the noisy stuff you got in your room/basement/living room actually produced some real scientific results.

For all these reasons, and though we may need some discussion with projects admin on their forum due to point 4/, I would like to push some form of involvement in GPUGRID, GPU wise first, and CPU-wise when their GROMACS client is ready.

I support also WCG because they got significant results, though I do not think their FAAH software is cutting edge when compared to GROMACS or OPENMM. On the other hand, what MCM does is very basic but with promising output, so I endorse this one also...

Let me know what you think of these opinions !

To me, the variety of BOINC is a long term positive and initial negative. We have a ton of great guides (thanks Gilthanis and many others) but they take a lot of time going through and digesting. However the team can't only run 2 or 3 projects. That would take away the fun of exploring.

That said, having some baseline projects would be good. Projects that we will always have some members running so that new members don't join a seemingly dead team. I don't see a single project working well here. In my opinion it has to be split based on platform:

NVidia GPUs: GPUGRID is obvious to me, cutting edge platform, CUDA, very competitive team and world community

CPUs: not so sure, WCG? I like the science and variety, though not exactly exciting to run or pushing hardware/technology bounds. GPUGRID has GROMACS, but the boinc client isn't really designed for MT and the project is an initial test. PrimeGrid is fun, has AVX and even Haswell FMA (I think) and can be fun when you find primes, but has debatable value. I've got to keep playing around more in this area.

AMD GPUs: Milkyway is fun, seems it probably will survive at least another year. Einstein works well too. I haven't explored much beyond that unfortunately.

But the gist of it is (a) projects that are almost always running, (b) projects that give reasonable points and validate quickly, (c) no super special setup/requirements, (d) science and (e) technology we can get excited about. Just some projects to 'spoon feed' and hopefully get new-old donors excited, and then they will continue to contribute to those core projects and new ones.

Then the competitions are a great way for new members to come together as a team and try new (or different) projects once they are more comfortable with the basics of BOINC.

Grandpa_01 said:

The purpose of DC Vault is to help out some of the lesser projects thus the more popular a project is the less points there is per position and 10,000 = #1 lets say there are 10,000 teams folding FAH so each position = 1 point so since [H] is the number 1 team it gets 10,000 points and EVGA is #2 it would get 9999 points. Now lets say another project only had 100 teams crunching it the #1 team would get 10,000 points the #2 team would get 9900 what it does is encourage people to run the less popular projects by rewarding more points per position http://www.dc-vault.com/showcat.php?by=6&cat=2&order=desc If you look at what the goal of the DC Vault is it makes more sense.
http://digik-oz.nl/dcVaultStats.aspx?team=[H]ardOCP

Click to expand...

Yes that does make a lot more sense when you put it that way.

Also, you pulled out yet another new stat site that there probably is a link to somewhere in one of the hundreds of threads. For the spoon feeding I think it would be great to have a more concise document that says if you want to join the horde, here are the steps.
Step 1: Link to Boinc client install guide
Step 2: How and where to login to BAM! / What is BAM!
Step 3: Pick one of these projects to get started with (suggest ones that are stable, well supported, and not alpha / beta)
Step 4: Add our team to your projects (Using BAM is much simpler)
Step 5: See your progress at these locations! (Boincstats, Free-dc, DigiK-oz, Formula-boinc)
Step 6: What to know more? (Links to terminology / differences between Vault, Boinc, distributed.net, etc)


There are directions that do cover most of this already, but I think they are a bit buried. I think most people will probably look at the step by step directions for installing BOINC and just skim / skip over them then miss the info 4 pages down about teams. Also, I think it's a lot easier to just add your teams from Boincstats than the other method documented. They could copy & paste [Hard|OCP] and it would find it right away and you can add it to more than one project at the same time. On the individual project pages the join a team link didn't seem to show up right away and I'm not sure what I did to finally get it to show up.

bman212121, have you looked at the BOINC installation guide I made? It has what you are asking with pictures walking you through all of that. The only thing missing is how to setup an account with the BOINCStats website. Making a guide for navigating all the functions and options of the BOINCStats website would be a huge project for someone considering they have a lot on their site. However this a link to BOINCStats with the step by step instructions for setting up BAM! in I believe post #13.

Also, if you look at the very first post in the BOINC thread...there is links to just about everything needed and more. The more advanced users are the ones that will probably have to search for more or simply post in another thread asking for help.

As far as Bio/Medical projects, none of them have all of the requirements mentioned above at this time. GPUGrid runs out of work, is just getting into the MT market, does not support AMD GPU's nor Intel GPU's (yes BOINC supports those now ). WCG has supported GPU's in the past, but what you need to understand is that WCG does not write any of the code nor does it decide the hardware supported. WCG is just the gateway to other scientists needing their work crunched. So, if the scientists aren't on the bleeding edge of programming the latest and greatest, then you have to deal with what you get. To keep the science as true as possible, they don't open their apps to user meddling. Projects that allow custom clients tend to have a lot more problems. Unfortunately, the projects with the most up to date apps, and widest selection available, also tend to be the math based projects. PrimeGrid is an outstanding project. Collatz does a great deal too. However, I don't recall what versions of CUDA they are using. Last I checked GPUGrid was the only ones using v.6.

Now, for those stuck in FAH thinking, the other thing you need to look at is that in the examples above, people were purchasing their BA equipment because of the absurd point payouts that they brought from bonuses. As you have noticed, the demand for those have shifted and so, the points are no longer worth the systems. Most BOINC projects don't need 4P rigs, but rather consumer hardware. GPU based projects will certainly favor the GPU's because a single GPU can outproduce even an 8P system depending on the project. You will find that depending on the project selected will determine where you would invest you money. This may be a turn off for some of the BA players switching over. The other thing brought up is the amount of resources needed to get to the top of the charts. This is true. Our team isn't as big as it thought. FAH is just one small space in the DC Universe. (I prefer Marvel) So, we definitely have a lot of work to do to become #1 elsewhere. WCG has teams that are corperate based. IBM and SONY are just a few. IBM installs WCG on all of the employees laptops. SONY was installing it on consumers laptops as an option to activate when they first set them up. I actually worked on one recently and the girl didn't even know she had done it. You have college/universities that will also install their client. So, as you can see, there is quite a bit of competition to swim in.

I don't like the idea of making the official projects a wide variety or even an ongoing challenge. As mentioned above, it is overwhelming for new people or even those transitioning. Just because it isn't the official assignment doesn't mean we wont still do it. I have always given WCG a share of my resources even during pushes/challenges/testing/etc... There is no reason things will change from my current setup. Others could still do the same. I encourage them to. But on the books, we need to have an official agenda so that those that don't want to hop, will have their place.

I agree that we need separate threads for each project the team supports. I created the BOINC thread because at the time the team commitment to it was small. It is now growing and needs a little expansion. I will still post in there for a lot of the off projects that aren't as popular or if there is something new that might effect multiple projects. It was also designed to get my updates of non-Vault projects out of the DC-Vault thread. We already have several threads for achievements and those have been linked on the first post of the BOINC thread. I do update the first post when I think there is something helpful or needed. Unfortunately, it is a lot of reading.

Gilthanis said:

bman212121, have you looked at the BOINC installation guide I made? It has what you are asking with pictures walking you through all of that. The only thing missing is how to setup an account with the BOINCStats website. Making a guide for navigating all the functions and options of the BOINCStats website would be a huge project for someone considering they have a lot on their site. However this a link to BOINCStats with the step by step instructions for setting up BAM! in I believe post #13.

Click to expand...

Just to be clear, you are referencing this? http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1768558

You can get to it from this thread: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1781171 under WCG. I know that there are directions that walk you through setting up boinc which are very great, but I guess what I'm really saying is that it would be helpful to have a better "table of contents" on this page for each of the items I listed. I didn't even see post #13 in that thread as it's like 20 screens down and past a configuration guide for Ubuntu. I think it's a lot more noob friendly to someone who doesn't know that a configuration guide is buried underneath another config guide to have direct links to it so it's super easy to find the info you need. Sorry if that sounds really picky but I think it will help new comers find the info they want faster. Think of it as like needing a TL;DR section for the guide. The guide is so long and through that someone who will just find the client download and install it won't bother to read the guide, but will then be missing important bits they don't know where to find. (No one is too lazy to ready a long post right?? )

F@H With Windows V7 GUI

1) Apply for a passkey at http://fah-web.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/getpasskey.py. You will need to pick a doner name and enter an email address. Your passkey will be sent to your email address. Do not discard your passkey email.
2) Download the current client from: https://folding.stanford.edu
3) Install the client using all of the default options
4) When the installer is finished, let it start the client. You will see a Windows firewall pop-up about fahclient.exe. Click "Allow access".
5) This will open your default web browser pointing to: http://folding.stanford.edu/client/. Click the Identity tab on the page that loads. On the Identity page, enter the donor name and passkey you got from step 1 and team 33. Don't forget to click Save when you are finished.
6) Click the Home tab to return to your home page. Move the intensity slider from Medium to Full. This will force the client to start if it hasn't yet. A definition of the settings can be found below.

Off Folding is disabled
Idle light: Folding will proceed at a reduced speed only when your computer becomes idle.*
Idle: Similar to Idle Light, but tries to get the maximum productivity from your computer only when you are away.
Light: Folding proceeds at a reduced speed at all times, but productivity and system utilization increases when you are away.
Medium: Much more productive than Light. This setting is recommended for most users.
Full: Contribute as much as possible. This setting may cause some machines to get hot or the fan to run very hard. If this is a problem simply move this slider to a lower setting.


You are now folding for Team [H]ardOCP! We have some screenshots of a pretty typical install HERE

Click to expand...

This is actually a great example of what I'm trying to say. It's a very short condensed install that gives you each of the pieces and where to do them at, and also provides links to the more detailed instructions should you need help with it. If you are familiar with FAH from before all you might need is the team name for the project you want to run. From the WCG page there is no quick and easy way to get that info. You can clearly see the team name in FAH and anyone familiar with FAH could skim that post and get the team name to add to their client.

The [H]orde|Central v4.0 was last updated by m33pm33p before the FAH fall through and was the first real attempt to expand outside of FAH. Looks like a time for an update. Thanks for pointing that out. I will see if I can get ahold of him.

As an outsider looking in I hope you all don't mind me joining the discussion. I will not say what you should do but I do have some recommendations since I spend a lot of time running Bio/Medical projects and looking for new ones.

The real problem your going to run into is finding one project that will let you use your CPU's along with AMD or Nvidia GPU's. There is only one possibility out there right now that might let you do this in the future, Poem@Home. This is the only Bio/Medical project that I know of that will work with both AMD and Nvidia GPU's. But they are not quite there just yet with their GPU application. Then there is the running out of work issue.

So your probably going to have to mix and match.

GPU Grid for those Nvidia users out there. Plus a possible CPU application. Yes, they do run out of work from time to time but not as often as other projects.

There there are all the projects that offer CPU only work. Just about every one of these projects run out of work from time to time.

Rosetta, older project that always seems to have work but has a few technical issues for some people.

CAS@Home, lack of work. Then there is the issue of being based in China and hard to communicate with. IE: they don't pay any attention to their own forums.

NRG, they are currently installing a new server and claim to have a lot of work to run once its up and running. But right now they have nothing to run.

Mind Modeling, notorious for lack of work.

Malaria Control, notorious for server issues.

Simap (this project will stop offering work by the end of 2014 and go to running everything in house)

So, not a huge range to choose from. Your best bet would be WCG and GPU Grid for Nvidia GPU users.

AMD GPU users are going to be the ones left out until Poem gets their GPU application fully online. The only suggestion I have is maybe put those AMD GPU's to work on projects in another field. Your only options are pretty much going to be the following projects.

Seti@Home
Milkyway@Home
Prime Grid
Collatz Conjecture
Asteroids

I tend to stick to Bio/Medical projects by preference but as you can see it can be frustrating from time to time due to lack of work at one or multiple projects. When none of the others has work I tend to fall back on WCG or branch out and run something else entirely for a bit. Good luck and happy crunching!

Just to be clear as I have not been in IRC much recently.

1. FAH and a couple of others will become the official projects for the team
2. [H]orde and Commandos are now one and the same


I have no problem with either, fold/crunch on!!

¿nuevo proyecto?

Gilthanis said:

The [H]orde|Central v4.0 was last updated by m33pm33p before the FAH fall through and was the first real attempt to expand outside of FAH. Looks like a time for an update. Thanks for pointing that out. I will see if I can get ahold of him.

Click to expand...

Okay, is there maybe a time you guys are on IRC? As much as I hate making documentation up (thankfully I have people who I work with who are better at making up these types of things) I feel like it might be useful to maybe help with some of the things a brand new user to the BOINC scene might face. I think it's a lot more difficult for the person who wrote the documentation to know what someone else might face because if you wrote it you know where it is and how to interpret it. I'd love to see something that is very easy to navigate and help new users join in on the fun so the Horde can grow again!

Having a good place that links to all of the knowledge the experienced users have would really help break down any barriers a new person would have and make it much more inviting to join. I'd hate to see someone get frustrated and turned away because of some of the inconsistencies that are present in BOINC.

Gil, you know I have a lot of respect for you and all the time/effort you put into the hardforums so please understand the following comments are NOT a personal attack but merely the thoughts of a long time [H] member who see this form go through a never ending cycle of good strong crunching followed by large departures of user for various reasons every couple of years. I'm not as active as I used to be in posting on the boards, and I've never been on the IRC channels so I'll try not to read between the lines too much.

I think that this thread, while healthy discussion, is MOSTLY unneeded and over restricting. First its suggested that we should have a consistent team moniker? Why? If you notice there is not, to my recollection, an official Commando roster or member list. There have been many of these monikers around the forms as others have pointed out. I think anyone should be able to use any of these, or start using another clever one as the environment changes. I don't see a need to unify these or try and limit these in any way. But if a new beginners guide is developed probably both of these terms should be defined in an all-inclusive manner as I agree we don't want people to feel divided or unwelcome in any way.

Secondly it is suggested that some folks think we need a new official project. While I would support a recommended "starter" project or two in a beginners guide of some sort, i personally think the idea of an official project would NOT be a benefit to the forum and quite honestly is a little ludicrous. An "Official" project named by a forum member really isn't official - unless it has the backing of the owners of the site. My biggest concern here is that, as EXT64, pointed out the strength of BOINC is the wide variety, the options, and the freedom it provides. People can still participate on a team and crunch a project they believe in/choose. Yes all the projects can be a bit confusing, especially when veteran members throw around terminology and buzzwords that a rookie would have no clue about, but i think a suggested beginners guide so to speak is a realistic fix, that doesn't pigeon-hole the forum into this same problem when in a year or two the next "official project" loses funding/changes drastically/loses mainstream support/has poor admins/etc. I don't see any value in determining an unofficial "official project".

The rest of the post is basically out of our control. Yeah we cant merge WCG teams so new users have to know which one to join. Just like they needed to know to join "Team 33" (not Team 34) in f@h. The team to join can go in a beginners guide but why would we abandon the existing teams and create yet another one just further muddying the waters? Stats are pretty good at BOINCStats and FreeDC. I'm to sure we need to try and reinvent the wheel here, but rather just share some links with new users. Perhaps we could even contribute code/donate money to the existing projects?

Im sure I've bored everyone one to tears so I'll just leave with a final thought. Originally the BOINC movement was brought to the [H]ardforum by a few people that were tired of the drastic changes always being made to f@h and wanted more options and less politics. The DC Vault was a fun way for those folks to compete, improve our team standing, and have a variety of ways to help research projects. Please don't try and take the openness of the BOINC platform and jam it into a single effort, or you'll end up losing the strongest attribute of the BOINC platform.
Thanks for reading.

Original DC Vault thread if anyone wants to read the first few pages:
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1376603&highlight=dc+vault

metallicafan, I am not offended in any way. The whole point of this thread was to get thoughts, ideas, and awareness out there in hopes of getting the team feeling great about the DC vibe and unified again. Currently, there are members who are lost in translation, members overwhelmed by all of the options, and some discouraged. There are some very good suggestions already and I'm hoping more people post their own personal thoughts as well. As far as "official" projects, we are in that early stage of finding out what the team wants before making a formal proposal to Kyle. It does no good to go to him without a finished proposal. So, if it just means using one project as the example in a simplified How To guide....I'm fine with that. I was just asked to make the post and get the idea out there so the team could have a say and make this place a much better and organized place.

I have also started the process of requesting team founder to be changed at most of the BOINC projects. I did not do WCG because I feel that metallicafan has done just fine so far and he still pops in the forums. Unless he doesn't want it any more (which he can PM me if he wants to add anything), I will leave that project as is.

bman212121 said:

Okay, is there maybe a time you guys are on IRC?

Click to expand...

I'm usually on and off through the work day and then sometimes for a small bit around 9pm CST during the week. Weekends are hit and miss.

I will be updating WFeather on the changes needed to [H]orde|Central v4.0 thread http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1781171 in the next day or two. I think I will take the suggestion of using a single project as the easy to setup and crunch introductory project and put some reference links and a quick 1 2 3 setup instruction as suggested.

I think the project I will list is WCG for these reasons:
1. It is already a [H] dominant project.
2. It is a well managed project that never seems to run out of work. (It may run out of work for a sub project but rarely has zero work over all.)
3. This project is probably the most security minded out of all of the BOINC projects. This is why they offer their own branded version of the BOINC software. It has gone through their own extensive testing and auditing before they sign off on it.
4. They have very active forums.
5. They have a variety of science to choose from.
6. Their work units are known for being pretty reliable and rarely have drastic consequences on the users experience. ( I will note that their work units for ARM are the exception)
7. Their badges are based on run time, so low end systems have incentive to still be of use.

DISCLAIMER: This is my opinion and my opinion only. I do not mean to offend anyone.

metallicafan said:

Originally the BOINC movement was brought to the [H]ardforum by a few people that were tired of the drastic changes always being made to f@h and wanted more options and less politics. The DC Vault was a fun way for those folks to compete, improve our team standing, and have a variety of ways to help research projects. Please don't try and take the openness of the BOINC platform and jam it into a single effort, or you'll end up losing the strongest attribute of the BOINC platform.

Click to expand...

I knew this was coming - the reason you and Gilthanis and probably most of the Commandos (before the mass exodus from F@H at least) like BOINC is the exact reason I hate it. I want a single goal and a single team, not 50 different teams and 50 different rankings and thus 50 different goals. I know this will sound harsh, but I feel that it boils down to this: do you want to participate or do you want to win? Spreading already limited resources out over a bazillion different projects points towards participation. The F@H mindset was always to win, which spurred the competitions and the ramping and EVGA overtake threads and the inter-team and intra-team banter. I do not see that ever happening with BOINC as this "team" operates now - as a handful of people going off in their own directions. There is no competition, which (to me) means no motivation.

===========================================

Why I liked Folding@home with [H]
1. Simple scoring - I had two numbers: ppd and total points
2. Exponential reward for money spent - QRB and bigadv are my friends
3. A single project, and a single goal
4. Simplicity (and I probably mean familiarity more than simplicity)
5. Competition - both intrer-team and against EVGA
6. Community - many folder on the forum and in IRC
7. Accomplishment - both personal and team

Why I can't get into BOINC:
1. What should I be crunching? I have no idea - and don't tell me "whatever you want".
2. No expensive hardware bonus - great for most I realize, but bad for me.
3. Multiple projects, multiple accounts, multiple stats pages - How am I doing? No clue.
4. No team concept (I realize that is part of what this thread is about.)

========================================================

That said, I doubt I would seriously participate even if we did migrate to a single BOINC project. I have a few machines still running F@H, a few instances of DIMES still going, and I set up BOINC on an old tablet (which seems to have returned one result in 2 days, so that may not be worth bothering with.) My priorities have changed, and thousands of dollars for distributed computing is no longer something I am willing to do. The announcement of F@H pulling bigadv was just convenient timing.

I couldn't resist...

[10:00] <+musky_work> Gilthanis, AKA VJ Pande....

Click to expand...

musky said:

Why I liked Folding@home with [H]
1. Simple scoring - I had two numbers: ppd and total points
2. Exponential reward for money spent - QRB and bigadv are my friends
3. A single project, and a single goal
4. Simplicity (and I probably mean familiarity more than simplicity)
5. Competition - both intrer-team and against EVGA
6. Community - many folder on the forum and in IRC
7. Accomplishment - both personal and team

Why I can't get into BOINC:
1. What should I be crunching? I have no idea - and don't tell me "whatever you want".
2. No expensive hardware bonus - great for most I realize, but bad for me.
3. Multiple projects, multiple accounts, multiple stats pages - How am I doing? No clue.
4. No team concept (I realize that is part of what this thread is about.)

Click to expand...

Exactly. Getting into BONIC is just too complicated at this point.

Gilthanis said:

I couldn't resist...

Click to expand...

You need the full story for context:

[09:57] <+musky_work> Commandos are separatists
[09:57] <+Gilthanis> The idea was either you went FAH or were the red headed step child of the team
[09:57] <+musky_work> they defected from the main [H] project
[09:57] <+musky_work> Confederates
[09:57] <+Gilthanis> or were never a part of it.....................
[09:57] <+foxtrotniner> north korea
[09:57] <+musky_work> rebels
[09:58] <+Gilthanis> people whom saw the light early
[09:59] <+musky_work> abolitionists
[09:59] <+musky_work> who torn at the very fabric of [H] unity
[09:59] <+musky_work> and now, want to assimilate the pieces after they torn down the system
[10:00] <+musky_work> it is all a conspiracy
[10:00] <+Shadow__X> is it?
[10:00] <+musky_work> Gilthanis, AKA VJ Pande....
[10:00] <+CarlB> lol
[10:00] <+musky_work> makes sense now, doesn't it?
[10:01] <+Gilthanis> I'm quoting musky on that one.... I LOL'd
[10:01] <+musky_work> (and hopefully you realize I am not serious)
[10:01] <+musky_work> (or am I?)
[10:01] <+CarlB> (we'll never know)
[10:01] * musky_work plays X-Files music
[10:02] <+CarlB> I WANT TO BELIEVE!
[10:02] <+musky_work> BELIEVE!

Click to expand...

musky said:

snip

Click to expand...

I understand where you are coming from, that's why I think even within the BOINC universe are focus should be on WCG plus I believe it fulfills the primary mission which was originally a focus on putting our machines to work for the benefit of mankind.

musky, thanks for sharing your thoughts; the viewpoint is an important one to consider. I hope my previous post didnt make me seem close minded or resistant to change. We have different viewpoints and I don't view either one of them as wrong. Whatever the group decides is best I'll support.

I've never been willing to spend thousands of dollars on distributed computing. Its been a fun side-hobby but grad school has left me with fewer resources (time/money) to contribute. I just enjoy throwing a few CPU cycles to fellow academics. OTOH, likely none of us would be here if it weren't for some level sportsmanship and competition.

Zoramac has already transferred team foundership of SETI over to me. Thanks for that Zoramac. Hopefully everything else goes smooth. I also set up a BOINC-wide team. This way if a new project activates this feature in the server software, it will automatically create a team for us with me as the founder. This will hopefully save a lot of future headaches with multiple names.

metallicafan said:

musky, thanks for sharing your thoughts; the viewpoint is an important one to consider. I hope my previous post didnt make me seem close minded or resistant to change. We have different viewpoints and I don't view either one of them as wrong. Whatever the group decides is best I'll support.

I've never been willing to spend thousands of dollars on distributed computing. Its been a fun side-hobby but grad school has left me with fewer resources (time/money) to contribute. I just enjoy throwing a few CPU cycles to fellow academics. OTOH, likely none of us would be here if it weren't for some level sportsmanship and competition.

Click to expand...

Your post reflects your opinion - which I suspect happens to be shared by most, if not all, of the pre-exodus Commandos. My post was just a spin on what us hard-core folders are feeling with regards to BOINC in general and how we have viewed [H]'s participation in it. The [H]orde and the other big teams have basically perverted DC participation into an "arms race" of sorts - which happened to be something I enjoyed.

There is certainly nothing wrong with how you and the other original Commandos approach DC - I'd say it is more in line with how the various projects intend it to be approached. I would not expect you to change regardless of where we end up as a team, nor would I ever suggest that you should.

Gilthanis said:

The [H]orde|Central v4.0 was last updated by m33pm33p before the FAH fall through and was the first real attempt to expand outside of FAH. Looks like a time for an update. Thanks for pointing that out. I will see if I can get ahold of him.

Click to expand...

WFeather updated the thread for me. Take a look at it and let me know if it will suffice or if there are changes still needed.

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1781171

Gilthanis said:

So, what does everyone think? There is no wrong answer or opinion. I would like people to chime in because that is the only way we hear the voices with concerns or opinions. I don't even care if it was something you have stated a thousand times. Please add any additional thoughts that may need considered too.

Click to expand...

I take a couple months off to concentrate on a pro car stereo install and now all this?
Wow - Hey Gilthanis, take a deep breath and relax just a [H]bit.

Gilthanis said:

WFeather updated the thread for me. Take a look at it and let me know if it will suffice or if there are changes still needed.

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1781171

Click to expand...

It's getting closer. Let me see if I can add a few more suggestions:

F@H isn&#8217;t the only Distributed Computing field [H] dominates! We also have brothers in arms actively working on World Community Grid projects!
Once again our members have come through and created outstanding guides that simplify the process of setting up and getting started.


1) Download the BOINC client from Berkeley if using Windows/Mac. http://boinc.berkeley.edu/download.php
Download If installing under Linux, I recommend you use the one in the repository from within your distro's software manager. ("You can click on Menu > Administration > Software manager" and search for boinc in Mint(Don't have Ubuntu so not sure if that is the same or not) or run "sudo apt-get install boinc" from a terminal window on Mint / Debian / Ubuntu EDIT: Maybe just the Sudo apt-get part. If you don't know what a repo is or where it's located they probably need the detailed instructions...
2) Install the software using which options you prefer. Refer to the BOINC Setup Guide linked below for Windows and Linux for more detailed instructions. Please ask one of us if the settings don&#8217;t make sense. If you choose to install as a service, you will not have the option to use GPU&#8217;s. (If installing to Windows 8 or 8.1, make sure you are installing from a local account and NOT a Microsoft account.) If you need help with the install, please reference the link below or drop a post in the forums. (Windows 8 and 8.1 isn&#8217;t shown in the Guide at this time)
3) After it is finished, the software will most likely prompt for a restart if the OS is Windows. Do so.
4) When Windows starts up or after finishing the install under Linux, it will prompt you to attach to a project or an account manager. (pictures in the BOINC Setup Guide) I recommend using an account manager if you intend on supporting more than one project. (not a direct link)BAM Setup If you want to just support the one project, we are recommending World Community Grid. You will find it on the list after selecting the option to attach to a project. (Again, photos of the process is in the guide linked below.
I think this is good, the one recommendation at this setup might be to include a link to the All inclusive DC Vault project so people can look it over. Do you think it would be better to link here or maybe right after to say if you are interested in other projects look at this link after the steps?


5) To join the team, you must go to the project (in this case WCG) and login. Got to [url=&#8221;https://secure.worldcommunitygrid.org/index.jsp&#8221;](not a direct link)WCG Under your account options you will be able to join a team. Click My Contribution, click My Team, click Find a Team, search for HardOCP, Click on that team, then click Join Team. Keep in mind that if you are attaching to other BOINC projects, their pages will be a little different because they typically use the default BOINC template. An example is in the BOINC install guide linked below. WCG designs their own page. You can also see a list of projects that have different team names here: [url=&#8221;http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1040548916&postcount=5&#8221;](not a direct link)Team Name List I think maybe a bit more explanation of the teams would be good here. Just a line that says something like we have different names if you use other projects, please look at this link if you want to add another project to verify you are using the correct team name.
6) Go back to your BOINC Manager and do an project update. You should see the team name appear.


None of these links work at present
BOINC Setup Guide
Advanced BOINC configurations
http://BOINC Client optimized for mu...chines &#8211; Linux
Team Challenges
Definitely think there should be a link to the All inclusive DC Guide with these links. That and anything else that is important for BOINC that doesn't have a direct link. Might need another page with FAQs of some kind or some more quick links to just speed up navigation. Like start a page that has all of the links to each projects official discussion thread. (Unless you think it would be better served to have those on the DC Guide page)

Maybe in the future there could be an update to the terminology section to include things like Vault, BOINC, BAM!, and some of the things that are not already listed.

Razor_FX_II said:

I take a couple months off to concentrate on a pro car stereo install and now all this?
Wow - Hey Gilthanis, take a deep breath and relax just a [H]bit.

Click to expand...

Lol

That has to be the biggest car stereo in history, because in reality since 7/31/2013 untill yestarday you have made a total of 2 post on 4/18/2014 at least according to your user history. So it took slightley over a year to do that job. Wow can it bounce the car off the streat.

Bman212121, I saw the links weren't there. I think he copy pasted and it didn't copy the linking properly. I have alread asked him to fix the links. As far as some of the additional info, would it not be easier to point them to the very first post in the BOINC thread that has links and a mass majority of the additional info. It just seems like kicking a dead horse. I don't mind adding it again because it may help people find the info, but it really does seem like showing them more than the basic setup in a simple setup for newbs guide. Thoughts?