LHC@home

BOINC released a development version 5.1.1 on August 31, 2005, and the LHC server has not been updated to accommodate this change. Einstein@home, on the other hand, is able to handle this new version with no problems.

We would like to, of course, assist BOINC development and still be able to assist LHC.

Thank you.

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Regards,
Bob P.

There is no news of testing the 5.x branch code at lhc@home-alpha yet.

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We are waiting to get another server which we will use for backup and testing purposes. We will install BOINC5 and MySQL4 on that and start alpha-testing. But I don't know when this will happen.

Anyway, we are not in hurry with BOINC5. We let other projects experiment with it for a while and see how they are doing:)

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Markku Degerholm
LHC@home admin

just info: according to the mailing list, 5.X will become possibly recommended version as soon as within october 05. david anderson invited the project admins to call him, he offered to walk project admins through the upgrade process...

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...LHC was one of the last projects to go through the 4.x upgrade IIRC and likely will be the story again for 5.x. Besides, just because Berkeley says "Boinc 5.x is now the recommended version" doesn't mean that everyone is going to hop on it immediately. There's no news at the alpha site or on production which indicates LHC has their new server and until that happens or unless they change plans...

I'm sure they're very aware of what is going on with Boinc 5.x - It's better to play the cautious side, especially when they have a system that's working (versus a "new" system that breaks).

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i was not going to rush them or "threat" them that i leave if they don't upgrade or something like that, only meant as info in case they were not aware of the new client version soon to be considered as recommended for many (and many will switch, i am sure of that, most people are just as happy to see their software version numbers rise like they are with their credits).
as always, each project has to go the way it considers best for their needs, and like you said, better have fewer crunchers on 4.X that actually do work than a broken 5.X system...

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<blockquote>and many will switch</blockquote>
Many have already switched, as evidenced by the multitude of threads started about this one topic.

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.... better have fewer crunchers on 4.X that actually do work than a broken 5.X system...

I have been using 5.1.* for a month and have run into no problems whatsoever. In fact, I find it more user friendly and reliable, and I like it a lot. So it does have some real world testing under its belt.

But I realize each project has to weigh the plusses and minuses themselves, knowing what are the risks for either course of action.

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Regards,
Bob P.

i think lhc's worries about v5 is more on the server side, not so much on the client side ;)

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<blockquote><blockquote>and many will switch</blockquote>
Many have already switched, as evidenced by the multitude of threads started about this one topic.</blockquote>
Others will not switch also.
Me, sure ; i'm using the CC 4.32 and i'm happy with it.

Anyway, i'm sure that all the servers of all projects will be upgraded... sooner or later...no choice.

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Do you want to get banned for 31 years, your account and credits deleted at a Boinc project ? Predictor@home is your best choice.

<blockquote>We are waiting to get another server which we will use for backup and testing purposes. We will install BOINC5 and MySQL4 on that and start alpha-testing. But I don't know when this will happen.

Anyway, we are not in hurry with BOINC5. We let other projects experiment with it for a while and see how they are doing:)
</blockquote>
LHC is now the only one of five projects I run which is not v5 compatible and this version will become the standard soon I think. Any updates on this?

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Get BOINC WIKIed

No.. nothing on alpha site either..

They'll let us know when it's time.

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It is not a crisis yet as we should not be using 5.x.y yet unless you have to test a specific problem or work on an issue. 4.72 works very well if you have a desire to get more of the capabilities of 5.

Rosetta@Home made the update today, so this may encourage them to make the change ...

It will be nice to have most sites back in sync so I can stop having to try to remember which system to use to make things bold ... :)

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Yeah, Rosseta updated to version 5.x today, and Predictor has been supporting it (I think since they did the major system upgrade, when they were offline for awhile until last week). Rosseta's staff reported no probs (for their end) and were back up in less then a day. Rosseta's progress is definitely encouraging. From what has been said here, I think LHC wants to see how things go. As 5.x is still in development and hasn't officially been released, there's no reason the LHC staff has to rush with 5.x support, and it does make sense to try it out on a test server before putting it in production...

All said, I'm going to try 5.x tonight on my home PC (though the Linux boxes at school I'll keep on 4.72 (under Linux) with LHC. I'm upgrading my system (the CPU is supposed to be here this Friday) so have to format anyway. Worst case, something doesn't go, it's only about 1.5 days. I'll decide whether to go back to 4.7x here or stick with 5.x on the new install once I've had some time to evaluate 5.x.

The decision for people is simple. There are plenty of projects out there (and I'm setup for 5 myself), to keep people's computers occupied doing some actual science regardless of one's choice on the CC right now. If people want to upgrade, they'll need to do work for projects on those computers which support their version of the BOINC CC, until the others have upgraded. Otherwise, they'll need to stick with the older version of the CC.

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What about CPDN? Anyone know off hand what their intentions are/if they upgraded?

I'd go look myself but [insert lame excuse here].

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Boinc 5.xx has been tested on the LHC@home alpha site, as of now there is no work, they must be evauluating the results and operation.
FYI

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<blockquote>What about CPDN? Anyone know off hand what their intentions are/if they upgraded?

I'd go look myself but [insert lame excuse here].

</blockquote>
CPDN has at least put the required files in so that 5.x.x clients can get work. I do not know if they have done the full upgrade yet or not.

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BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8

<blockquote>Boinc 5.xx has been tested on the LHC@home alpha site, as of now there is no work, they must be evauluating the results and operation.
FYI </blockquote>fharmon,

I've posted a question trying to clarify that on the alpha message board. The language in Chrulle's post there doesn't specify if they have patched the 4.x server to give work to 5.x clients or if they have upgraded the server to 5.x. As of 7 September, they were not testing server 5.x & are still waiting on a new server before they went to 5.x.

IIRC, an upgraded 5.x server doesn't give work to 4.x clients without modification and I'd like to know if that policy still stands (as it did from boinc server 3.x -> 4.x).

REMEMBER: There are boinc clients and boinc servers! A boinc v4 server can, if patched, give workunits to v5 clients; A Boinc v4 client can be patched such that it can receive work from a v5 server. :) Confusing but necessary to understand.

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<blockquote>IIRC, an upgraded 5.x server doesn't give work to 4.x clients without modification and I'd like to know if that policy still stands (as it did from boinc server 3.x -> 4.x).
</blockquote>

The short answer is the old policy is no longer enforced.

One of the big changes from version 4.x to version 5.x.x is that the artificial restrictions on communicating across major versions have been removed. A version 5 component will have no trouble with a component with a different major version just because of the version number, the lower version components may have trouble though. There may still be problems due to feature sets and communication formats.

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BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8

Do we hope now, that they let us run dry, because they want to upgrade the servers!!!
-just a hope!-

greetz littleBouncer

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