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Strange Linux SMP error

A

APOLLO

[H]ard|DCer of the Month - March 2009
Joined
Sep 17, 2000
Messages
9,089
I was going through the log of one of my Linux SMP installs and noticed this unusual error:

[08:51:24] Completed 247500 out of 250000 steps (99 percent)
[09:19:12] Writing local files
[09:19:13] Completed 250000 out of 250000 steps (100 percent)
[09:19:13] Writing final coordinates.
[09:19:14] Past main M.D. loop
[09:19:15] Will end MPI now
[09:20:15]
[09:20:15] Finished Work Unit:
[09:20:15] - Reading up to 21193200 from "work/wudata_04.arc": Read 21193200
[09:20:16] - Reading up to 526188 from "work/wudata_04.xtc": Read 526188
[09:20:16] goefile size: 0
[09:20:16] logfile size: CoreStatus = 75 (117)
[09:20:31] Error opening or reading from a file.
[09:20:31] Deleting current work unit & continuing...
[09:24:38] - Preparing to get new work unit...
[09:24:38] + Attempting to get work packet
[09:24:38] - Connecting to assignment server
[09:24:39] - Successful: assigned to (171.64.65.64).
[09:24:39] + News From Folding@Home: Welcome to Folding@Home
[09:24:39] Loaded queue successfully.
[09:24:51] + Closed connections

The error in question is underscored. I'm not certain if I have ever seen this particular problem before but the WU had completed as seems to be apparent from the log. What could have caused this to occur after completion? :confused:

I'm wondering if the error above might be related to another problem I have with this Linux installation. I occasionally get a message informing me that I have very little disk space left and that I should delete unwanted files, but this is a very recent installation and I allocated 4GB of disk space dedicated to the VM's use. Without any other applications installed besides F@H and whatever came with the distro, how can this be? :confused:
 
Look like the filesystem is having a problem in your instance which cause FAH to be unable to open a work file. Remember that you can allocate 10-20 GB but not commit the full size so the instance can grow if needed and not throw a error about disk space.

 
What distro are you using? 4GB might not be enough.

You can also type "df -f" at a shell to tell you everything you need to know about disk usage.


2.png
 
This distro is Kubuntu. 4GB was more than sufficient for various other distros I tried and some of them were bigger than this one. That client error might not be related to the warning message I'm receiving concerning disk usage. The disk usage results that displayed with the 'df' command seems to confirm the error message. There is a lot of disk space being consumed for some reason. Can I increase the size of the VM? If not, what can I safely delete in an OS I'm very unfamiliar with? Maybe there is too much virtual memory configured??

 
Has this installation been working? What happened after you got the new WU? You know, all that good stuff like thatl.

I do a custom install with VM and it calls for 8 gigs of disk space by default, per machine.

Did you install the 32 bit libaries? (that's how we say it here);)

As for knowing about the OS, no big deal at all really, you can simply cut and paste every command right from Stanfords web site so there is really no chance to screw it up.

Luck man;)

 
BillR said:
I do a custom install with VM and it calls for 8 megs of disk space by default, per machine.

Click to expand...

I'm surprised you can get that far with 8 MB of disk space :cool:

 
The bare minimum for Kubuntu is 4GB (8 GB recomended). That's for x86, I couldn't find anything on 64-bit, but I would guess you need a bit more. Remember, Ubuntu and its derivatives aren't in the tiny distro market (DSL and the like).
 
BillR said:
Has this installation been working? What happened after you got the new WU? You know, all that good stuff like thatl.
Click to expand...
The client is currently working on a new WU with no issues so far. Don't know what will happen when it completes. It has worked for about a week until today's error.

I do a custom install with VM and it calls for 8 gigs of disk space by default, per machine.
Click to expand...
I guess I should have allocated more space for the VM but for months I've been running other distros (Ubuntu, MEPIS, etc.) and none of the others gave me any low 'disk space' message. MEPIS, especially is a very loaded distro with all kinds of goodies and quite slow in terms of its response inside a virtual environment, yet I had no issues of low disk space with a 4GB allocation. Assuming that the two problems I outlined in the OP are connected, can I increase the disk space allocation for the VM, or am I stuck with 4GB?

Did you install the 32 bit libaries? (that's how we say it here);)
Click to expand...
Yes, I believe they're there. I see 'ia32-libs' installed in Adept Manager.

As for knowing about the OS, no big deal at all really, you can simply cut and paste every command right from Stanfords web site so there is really no chance to screw it up.
Click to expand...
Yes, the client-end stuff is quite easy but if I wish to delete apps, modules or files in order to free disk space, what can I safely remove?

Luck man;)
Click to expand...
Thanks, when it comes to Linux I need all the luck I can get. :D
 
One cure, and it’s down and dirty, stop the client, use the file manager in Linux, open “Folding” and delete the work folder. For some reason the work folder never empties everything and becomes quite full and at some point wants to write redundant files. That is where it falls apart.

This is just me, but when I delete the work file I also delete everything inside the folding folder except the two client programs and the client config file. That includes both core files so all I leave is the two program files, client config.

Don’t cost nutten and I find it works.

On any machine that has been producing don’t assume the problem is you or your installation.;)


 
OK, my Kubuntu installation appears to be unstable because I've had several EUEs since I posted last and didn't get a single completed WU through. Unfortunately, I cloned this VM many times and already have it running on several computers before I even realized there was a problem. Only one of these clones seems to have experienced issues, but that could be misleading and the others might get them.

In light of all of this, I've decided to try out yet another distro. I must have installed close to a dozen in the past few months. What distros are recommended? My criteria includes a GUI based on the KDE although I'm open to other environments. Second, I would like a relatively simple networking setup. And lastly, a small disk and memory footprint would be nice.

TIA

 
Heh, my favorite buntu install is nobuntu at all. However, Kbuntu isn’t horrible and it works as well as all the cut and paste lines at Stanford were pretty much based on that kernel.

While I don’t like cloning installs Tigger seems to do ok with it. At this point I’d say delete the whole VM and start over, that way you are positive everything is clean. For your install just leave the iso of the distro you choose. I usually just pop it into its own folder.

Once you have created two new VM’s go into each one and where it shows hardware unclick the CD Rom and right below that is a “read from file” check box. Check that box and browse to your iso and you are good to install. Do that for each VM.

Computers as a rule are not fond of used code:p;)


 
A good KDE based distro is OpenSuse. PCLinuxOS, MEPIS and Mandriva are also well liked.


2.png
 
I installed OpenSUSE in the summer and found it to be a bit slow in a VM, like MEPIS, especially via Tight VNC. Other than that, it was a nice distro while I had it running. I would eventually like to use a Fluxbox based distro because of the small resource use, but the distros I tried (antiX, Fluxbuntu) did not appear to be very F@H friendly. So, I'm in the search for a KDE-based distro since I find Gnome to be a rather annoying environment, otherwise I'd try the new 64-bit Linux Mint Elyssa x64 RC1 release. PCLinuxOS looks interesting and that's what I'll probably be installing next.

If anyone has additional recommendations please feel free to add them along with any comments as far as folding is concerned. I find since Stanford released the new GPU clients a few months ago, other clients and alternative OS setups have been relegated to a backseat discussion on this forum (understandably so).
 
alan2308 said:
A good KDE based distro is OpenSuse. PCLinuxOS, MEPIS and Mandriva are also well liked.
Click to expand...
Is PCLinuxOS available in 64-bit? I noticed on their site there's no mention of a 64-bit version unless I overlooked it.
 
APOLLO said:
Is PCLinuxOS available in 64-bit? I noticed on their site there's no mention of a 64-bit version unless I overlooked it.
Click to expand...

Sorry, I'm an idiot. PCLinuxOS is 32-bit only. I didn't even think about that when I mentioned it. How about I throw ALT Linux out there instead? :D

BTW, I can't remember, have you tried NotFred's Folding CD in a VM rather than a full installation?
 
alan2308 said:
Sorry, I'm an idiot. PCLinuxOS is 32-bit only. I didn't even think about that when I mentioned it. How about I throw ALT Linux out there instead? :D
Click to expand...
Interesting, I never heard of that distro. There are as many distros as grains of sand on a beach, LOL.

BTW, I can't remember, have you tried NotFred's Folding CD in a VM rather than a full installation?
Click to expand...
Yes, it was my first attempt at a Linux install many months ago but it didn't work on my systems for some reason. It has been updated since then but I still get corruptions and other errors I never get with standard distros. For example, 'hard drive image is corrupted.' :confused:

So, I'm still in preference of a distro with a GUI and very light resource footprint. Something with Fluxbox as WM would be nice but there aren't any 64-bit distros that have that WM by default. A third possibility would be a non-GUI distro such as the Gentoo minimal install (86 MB). I wish I knew enough about Linux to try something like that for the performance potential. However, navigating the Internet in text might pose a problem... :eek:
 
Navigating in text isn't all that bad. You'd be amazed just how snappy lynx or elinks feels.

Distrowatch will let you search every distro that it tracks based on several criteria. You might want to check it out, see what's out there that does what you want. http://distrowatch.com/search.php
 
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