Posts by KWSN - A Shrubbery

1) Message boards : Number crunching : Welcome QMUL Admins (Message 16178) Posted 22 Jan 2007 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: You make me proud to be a kaNI!ght Clark. And so as not to derail this thread further, welcome indeed. We look forward to working with the new crew.
2) Message boards : Number crunching : Ghosts and Pending Credit (Message 15414) Posted 11 Nov 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: I can't tell you how it's being implemented but I know it is possible. With Rectalinear Crossing Numbers I often see the message that xxxxx.xx result is being resent due to download problems. Every time one of my hosts connects it manages to compare my queue with what the server thinks I should have and resend the missing ones.
3) Message boards : Number crunching : Fairer distribuiton of work(Flame Fest 2007) (Message 15099) Posted 14 Oct 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: River, I have to say that your even approach and thoughful arguments are swaying my opinion. NanoHive is currently working on a system to spread workunits among more hosts. Personally, I don't beleive that BOINC was designed to accomplish this task and get results back quickly, but we'll see what their project engineers can pull off. If there is a way to do it server side (and from what I've read on various message boards it's not) their intention is a dynamic max results per CPU. Send out a limited number and not send more to that host until the previous results have been returned with no ultimate maximum per day. In any case, it should be an interesting study.
4) Message boards : Number crunching : Server Status (Message 14936) Posted 1 Oct 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: I'm pretty sure I read about a year ago it changes to 'low on work' below 100. Those 43 were most likely tagged for exotic systems and were waiting for similar systems to request work. Now, If only I had thought to retain a Commodore 64 to snatch up the results that had been assigned as such.
5) Message boards : Number crunching : Fairer distribuiton of work(Flame Fest 2007) (Message 14935) Posted 1 Oct 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: I'll have to side with the leave it alone crowd. Of the last five rounds of work my computers missed out on the first four. Due to the nature of randomness, all four of them checked for work within 5 minues of each other and all got work on this go. As everyone is operating under the same rule set it is inherently fair. If a computer is capable of downloading large amounts of work and completing it, I see no issue. If the work is intentionally distributed to the largest user base possible then you will invevitably be dealing with some of the slowest systems out there both in processing time and internet connections. So, that leaves possible advantages to your proposal and probable dis-advantages. I don't care for those odds. In any case, this whole argument will be moot as soon as Garfield comes on line.
6) Message boards : Number crunching : Why can't I get any work? (Message 14326) Posted 14 Jul 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: Of all my machines I got four as well. They all finished in under 5 seconds and will sit in my que as pending forever. Or at least until they get an adminstrator. My list of results gets larger yet again. Seems there is some sort of bug where results claiming zero never get validated or purged.
7) Message boards : Number crunching : I think we should restrict work units (Message 14287) Posted 11 Jul 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: Bored, bored, bored. Has anyone anything new to say? Oh sure, it's a slow news day: Life is inherently not fair, get used to it. Any attempt to make life more fair invariably results in making things worse. There is a reason that Utopia translates to nowhere. It doesn't exist, maybe someday in our far distant future but not now. The scientists are obviously getting their results in a manner that suits them or they would have changed the rules. And being as everyone operates under the same rules on this project I would have to conclude that the work distribution system is about as fair as is humanly possible. So, why would people complain? From the altruistic approach (helping the science as much as possible) everyone should be happy that there are enough contributors to download all the work available, it will clearly get done and not languish on a server somewhere for lack of CPU cycles. That leaves who gets the work. Obviously some people have faster computers or connections than others so they get a larger portion of work units. Well, it would seem to me that faster computers and connections would also crunch and return the results faster. Sounds like another plus for the project, more people should be happy the project is working so well. I guess the only remaining complaint is that (insert name here) didn't get their fair share. The only reson to complain about not getting work on your system is simply the way a child reacts when someone else is playing with a toy they want. Wouldn't that mean that the people who complain the loudest about not having work are truly looking out only for their own interests and not that of the project? Seriously, get a life, join another project or play within the rules that are given to you and stop complaining about who gets the majority of a limited resource. Be happy that the work is getting done and stop arguing on the internet. Win or lose it's still stupid. (And yes, I see the irony there).
8) Message boards : Cafe LHC : any thoughts on growing planets? (Message 14174) Posted 24 Jun 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: As with all great conspiracy theories, the mass of educated people must protect the innocent and naive from the real truth lest panic ensue. There is where the problem lies. It is simply not possible to have a large number of people keep anything secret for any length of time. The longer the time kept and the greater the number of people that know the "truth", the shorter the time it can be withheld.
9) Message boards : Number crunching : Where all the Teams Go? :( (Message 14123) Posted 23 Jun 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: Where all the Teams Go? :( Zappp! Gone! Gettin scared now, wanna go home. Teams, results, pending credit. It's all gone. I'd say they finally had the long anticipated database crash. Perhaps this will actually get someone onto the task of straightening things up a bit.
10) Message boards : Number crunching : 2 WUs won't upload (locked by file_upload_handler PID=20350) (Message 14066) Posted 20 Jun 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: Or if you are trying to upload this morning you can refer to the front page that the servers are down until this afternoon. If it doesn't clear up by the end of the 20th, I'd be concerned.
11) Message boards : Number crunching : I think we should restrict work units (Message 13921) Posted 10 Jun 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: As I post this (23.00 hrs UK time) the front page of the LHC site shows that there are still 340 WUs out there somewhere, still unprocessed. This is days after I (and I'm sure many other people!) had returned the final WU unit from the last batch of WUs to be issued. So those 340 WUs are being held in the cache of some irresponsible crunchers who 'hoard' work. This must ultimately slow down the whole LHC project! Jeez - when will some people learn that we are working for LHC, not LHC working for our egos..... how do you know that the "hoarders" didn't have a "proper" reason such as a slow modem or dial up line? Proper reason or not, the WU that are currently being processed are ones that had their origional deadline exceeded. Even the last WU sent from the recent batch would have timed out by now. Granted, things happen and sometimes it's not possible to return results but I seriously doubt this is the case with the majority of the current backlog. I don't have an issue with people having enough work to keep them running but manipulating the program to the point of work missing the deadline is excessive.
12) Message boards : Number crunching : I think we should restrict work units (Message 13392) Posted 17 Apr 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: I'd be inclined to believe River is on the right track. The project scientists are well aware of how to manipulate the deadlines to get the work they need. Now, on a semi-related note: I see several work units timing out after a quorum has been met. Will those units be re-sent or is the quorum already good enough?
13) Message boards : Number crunching : Up and Running Again (Message 12072) Posted 15 Jan 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: My computer started grabbing results almost immediately after release. I even got a valid result within the first 24 hours. Of course since then only one other has validated the remainder of my WU are waiting to be sent onto other hosts. Despite all the doom and gloom I hear from various people on the boards, the system works. Imagine that. ;-) Just glad to be of use to the science. I'll never be the top on stats and not sure I'd want to. It's just too much pressure.
14) Message boards : Number crunching : New work when? (Message 11835) Posted 5 Jan 2006 by KWSN - A Shrubbery Post: My personal goal is to reach > 0 credits. Wish me luck. I added a few new projects because of the current crunch over at S@H and would you beleive that currently 3/4 of them are down. At least we'll always have Paris, or was it Madagascar?

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