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Message boards : Graphics cards (GPUs) : Development BOINC 6.10.37 released

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MarkJ
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Message 15401 - Posted: 24 Feb 2010 | 12:41:26 UTC

Another new one to test for Linux, Mac and Windows

REMINDER TO ALL ALPHA TESTERS:
It's far easier for us to fix problems if you send message logs with the appropriate flags set. The main flags are:

<cpu_sched_debug>: problems involving the choice of applications to run.
<work_fetch_debug>: problems involving work fetch (which projects are asked for work, and how much).
<rr_simulation>: problems involving jobs being run in high-priority mode.

Use these flags from the cc_config.xml file.

Report any problems you get with it to the Alpha email list. This list needs registration.


The major change for the release and the reason for this release is the addition of the CPU Usage monitor configuration item in the advanced preferences dialog. We needed this to be available since most projects haven't upgraded their server software to support this preference item yet. Please try several different settings to see how it works. Please keep in mind it may take up to 20+ seconds before it engages.

----- Rom


Note from David
Specifically, the item is:
"Computing allowed
... While processor usage is less than ___ percent".

The default is 25%, meaning that BOINC will stop computing if non-BOINC CPU usage exceeds 25%. Either 100 or 0 remove the restriction and let BOINC compute whenever it otherwise would.


There have been reports that it has issues with cuda work fetch (ie it won't ask for cuda work).


Changes since 6.10.32 (6.10.33 for the Mac)

- WINSCR: cleanup configuration dialog text.

- Mac SS: change configuration dialog text to match new Windows wording.

- Mac installer: If installing an acct_mgr_url.xml file, don't install it directly into the BOINC Data directory. Instead, put it into the installer's resources and have the postinstall or postupgrade script copy it to the BOINC Data directory. This fixes a problem which would happen if the user later ran the standard BOINC installer without an acct_mgr_url.xml file: the Apple installer would then delete the file, causing BOINC to detach from the account manager.

- Mac Installer: add .txt extension to copyright files in GUI installer extras.

- Mac Installer: Fix receipt name for GridRepublic installer so we can remove it.

- graphics API: if font missing, find one that isn't (from Kevin)

- client: if GPU get available RAM fails, don't use the GPU

- client: detect CPU information via the cpuid instruction instead of the registry. This change is only for Windows but I haven't tested this with GCC.

- client: undo [17160]. <ncpus>0</ncpus> in cc_config.xml no longer means simulate zero CPUs. There are several places that divide by ncpus. Zero CPUs doesn't make any sense anyway.

- client: some more CPU detection cleanup.

- client: if a project is anonymous platform and it has no app versions that use a resource, don't request work from it for that resource.

- client: include CPU usage of client in BOINC total. Also include manager if its name includes "boinc" (can't figure out another way)

- manager: first whack at "suspend if CPU load exceeds x" in dialog

- screensaver: fix bug where sometimes no tasks are shown;

change font sizes for max of 2 sizes at a time

- client: don't accumulate LTD for projects w/ suspended jobs

- API: in txfRenderString, replace non-ASCII chars with ?. Otherwise it calls abort()!

- client: fix bug in "suspend if CPU load too high" feature. Forgot to convert between fraction and percentage

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Message 15402 - Posted: 24 Feb 2010 | 14:32:54 UTC

The compute percent limiter issue started with 6.10.32 but you can work around it by attaching to SaH and setting the preference on SaH site so you can continue to use remote settings. As other projects update the server code this setting will be more widely available. Remember if you use the local preference setting to set this one value it means you are on local preferences for all settings ... Set the value to 0 (or 100) to not have it in play.

Though UCB denies the issue I have had a system at 25% suspend randomly even while I was sleeping and thus not using the system 14 times over a 3 day period ... so ... upgrade with caution ... :)

The work fetch issues also stretch back to .32 in that I am having a related though not identical problem as reported by Richard where my dual ATI system has to run dry before it requests work.

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Message 15459 - Posted: 26 Feb 2010 | 12:43:41 UTC

Following hot on the heels of 34, we now have 6.10.35. As there isn't too much in this release it doesn't deserve its own message thread.

Changes since 6.10.34

This release contains the following three fixes:

- MGR: Fix a long-standing bug that made sizers fail on Mac for Advanced Preferences dialog: I added bSizer1->Fit(this) to end of constructor. To work around this bug, the dialog had been made resizeable and the height and width were saved in the Manager settings. But this meant that when we add an item to the dialog, it is too small until the user expands it. And Modal dialogs like this should not be resizeable. I also made the dialog no longer resizeable by the user. Remove second "between" in "Switch between applications between every".

- WIN: Add some missing CPU features to the feature list

- WIN: Make sure the Brand string for a CPU is printable. Older Intel processors have some control characters.

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Message 15561 - Posted: 2 Mar 2010 | 11:19:09 UTC

6.10.36 is out now.

Change log since 6.10.35

This release contains the following fixes:

- MGR: Save and restore height and width of Properties dialog; fix comments.

- client: if suspend a file xfer, set upload_offset to -1; that way it will query server for file length when it resumes, rather than uploading from the beginning

- client: if have coproc jobs but coproc is missing, skip those jobs in RR sim. Otherwise we add stuff to uninitialized data structures, and a crash can result.

- client: initialize the above data structures anyway

- client: fix bug that interfered with work fetch for particular resources in anonymous platform case.

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Message 15677 - Posted: 10 Mar 2010 | 18:44:26 UTC

It's already in *buntu repositories!
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Message 15684 - Posted: 11 Mar 2010 | 10:33:48 UTC

This now the Recommended (by BOINC.berkeley) version. For those who are running older versions please consider upgrading.
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Message 15706 - Posted: 12 Mar 2010 | 10:36:56 UTC - in response to Message 15684.

This now the Recommended (by BOINC.berkeley) version. For those who are running older versions please consider upgrading.


Forget that. It been pulled. 6.10.18 is now the "recommended" version. I've asked the mailing list why it was pulled.

Oh and 6.10.37 is out, only one fix supposedly:

Fixes: Properly display project descriptions on Windows XP machines in the attach to project wizard.

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Message 15722 - Posted: 13 Mar 2010 | 2:19:38 UTC - in response to Message 15402.

Though UCB denies the issue I have had a system at 25% suspend randomly even while I was sleeping and thus not using the system 14 times over a 3 day period ... so ... upgrade with caution ... :)


It's looking for CPU activity, not user activity. So when ever the OS or some other software decides it needs CPU time then BOINC will suspend. Personally I find this to be a great feature and much better than "stop while user is active" and / or "use xx % of CPU".

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Message 15729 - Posted: 13 Mar 2010 | 11:46:12 UTC

According to the guys on the mailing list it seems 6.10.36 got pulled because they found a couple of fixes which had been done to the wrong source tree.

Yesterday I found that a change David had made in trunk had not been back-ported to the 6.10 branch.

It was a bug with the suspend/resume functionality, which might explain the Linux menu bug.

I pulled the builds since the last public release until I could finish an audit of the differences between trunk and the 6.10 branch to see if anything else was missing.

I found only one unaccounted for change, which led to discovering a different bug in trunk. After I get both fixes back-ported to the 6.10 branch I'll be putting together a new build and release to alpha testing.

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Message 15736 - Posted: 13 Mar 2010 | 18:14:05 UTC - in response to Message 15722.

Though UCB denies the issue I have had a system at 25% suspend randomly even while I was sleeping and thus not using the system 14 times over a 3 day period ... so ... upgrade with caution ... :)


It's looking for CPU activity, not user activity. So when ever the OS or some other software decides it needs CPU time then BOINC will suspend. Personally I find this to be a great feature and much better than "stop while user is active" and / or "use xx % of CPU".

The only problem is that it will suspend when there is no one on the system... and it suspends all tasks on all cores. INstead of only freeing one or more cores, it suspends all ... and the 25% limit is also low ...

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Message 15747 - Posted: 13 Mar 2010 | 22:50:16 UTC - in response to Message 15736.

The only problem is that it will suspend when there is no one on the system... and it suspends all tasks on all cores. INstead of only freeing one or more cores, it suspends all ... and the 25% limit is also low ...


You're right, it's just that I see it as a solution, not a problem:

- on a normal PC you can just leave CPU-BOINC on all the time: the clients run at the lowest priority and the OS takes care of task switches, so you don't notice it running and there's no need to restrict it

- if you want to make sure the user is absolutely not disturbed just set it to "don't work while computer is in use"

These are the current options and they suffice for many situations. However, there are situations where they don't. Take for example a simulation PC where someone logs in, starts a long task in Matlab (triggering auto-parallelisation) or Ansoft HFSS. From personal experience I know that both of them use only 1 core, even if BOINC only runs at the lowest priority on the other cores. The result is a massive performance hit. Neither switching based on user activity, nor a long time before resuming BOINC after user activity (you can't know how long these tasks will take) or a static "use only xx% of CPU" will help, the latter one still leading to a slow down.

For such cases the new mechanism is ideal: just look for any cpu intensive tasks and stop BOINC to get full performance from your CPU. If you don't need this (i.e. the old control mechanisms are enough for you) then simply don't use it!
And the default limit of 25% is 1 full core of a quad. I don't think that's a coincidence.. and makes a lot of sense. In my examples the programs won't use more than 1 full core if BOINC is running, even though they could use all of them. So looking for anything more than 25% wouldn't detect them (on a quad). I'm wondering if 25% is a static default or if they set it to 1 core, choosing the percentage based on the number of cores present. Which would make a lot of sense IMO.

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Message 15763 - Posted: 15 Mar 2010 | 20:01:00 UTC - in response to Message 15747.

It slowed one of my tasks down, unnecessarily. OK, I was using more than 25% (well actually hovering around 25%, dipping over and below). The result; many stop-starts, lengthy logs and overall slowdown of task by about 25%.

That said, it might have been saving people with CC1.1 cards from crashes.

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Message 15769 - Posted: 15 Mar 2010 | 22:33:51 UTC

I'd really only activate it if you need to avoid a performance hit in some other application. For general use or power crunching it's obviously no good.

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Message 15778 - Posted: 16 Mar 2010 | 16:25:23 UTC - in response to Message 15769.

The new layout in Boinc Manager is a bit disorientating; the “While processor usage is less than 25%” is set to 25% by default, and could be seen as either separate to, or related to “Use GPU while computer is in use”.

Add a couple of double negatives and we would need to do professional Boinc courses to configure such settings.

It would make more sense to have a GPU Tab under which to configure the GPU!

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Message 15793 - Posted: 17 Mar 2010 | 9:49:08 UTC

6.10.39 is out for Windows. I haven't tried it and don't have any details on whats in it yet.

Apparently .38 crashes so don't bother trying it.
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Message 15795 - Posted: 17 Mar 2010 | 12:30:03 UTC - in response to Message 15793.

Only 6.10.37 is listed here,
http://boinc.berkeley.edu/download_all.php
6.10.39 is not listed.

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Message 15796 - Posted: 17 Mar 2010 | 13:55:53 UTC - in response to Message 15795.

Only 6.10.37 is listed here,
http://boinc.berkeley.edu/download_all.php
6.10.39 is not listed.

Sure it is:

http://boinc.berkeley.edu/dl/?C=M;O=D

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Message 15798 - Posted: 17 Mar 2010 | 14:29:42 UTC - in response to Message 15796.

:)
6.10.39 Installed without any issues.
Only obvious change is the table style layout (everything is underlined).

Under the Messages Tab there is a Button to "Show only this project", useful.
I think this is recent as I have not noticed it before, but I only had V 6.10.37 on for about 2days.

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Message 15804 - Posted: 17 Mar 2010 | 20:44:12 UTC - in response to Message 15798.

Under the Messages Tab there is a Button to "Show only this project", useful.


It's been there since quite a while ;)

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Message 15805 - Posted: 17 Mar 2010 | 21:01:43 UTC - in response to Message 15747.

The only problem is that it will suspend when there is no one on the system... and it suspends all tasks on all cores. INstead of only freeing one or more cores, it suspends all ... and the 25% limit is also low ...


You're right, it's just that I see it as a solution, not a problem:

The issue is that the default chosen triggered on my systems when I was in bed sound asleep. So the "solution" cost me compute time, not what I wanted at all ...

Also, for those of us that like to use web preferences, there is only a couple sites where you can set this to any other value. As projects update their code this will increase, but, projects are typically slow to do so ...

Personally I think it should have been defaulted to off and then those that are having issues could be advised to set it to on ...

I agree it is nice to have settings like this... the problem is that the defaults are usually set wrong...

Worse, I think most people that are seeing lag are seeing it from GPU applications and I am not sure that this setting is going to be all that useful for making that change... so far my experience is that the application's internals have more of an effect than changes to BOINC ... then again, that is just me ... YMMV ...

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Message boards : Graphics cards (GPUs) : Development BOINC 6.10.37 released

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