1) Message boards : Server and website : Can't upload (Message 30041)
Posted 4 days ago by nate
Not that we're aware of. Currenlty we're recieving WUs. It is possible that the internet in our building/area went down in the night, but we don't think so. Boinc clients shouldn't be crippled by that. Anyone else notice problems?
2) Message boards : Number crunching : Gianni is not short ?! (Message 30017)
Posted 4 days ago by nate
There are two main reasons why more credit is awarded on the long queue:
1) Greater risk for the cruncher to crunch (typically) much longer WUs. If a simulation crashes after 18 hours, that's a much bigger loss than a crash after 2 or 6 hours. This is especially true for older/slower cards.
2) To encourage/reward users who dedicate their computers to the long hours crunching that long WUs require. With he short queue, you can run a WU while you sleep or run errands, for example, and by the time you wake up or come home it's finished, and you can use your computer for other things. Dedicating a gpu/cpu/computer to run on long queue means you basically can't use it for other things, such as work, entertainment, etc., and so higher credits reward them for that.

Gianni's WUs may be slightly long for the short queue, but my recent tasks were definitely short for the long queue. The reason was that, at the time, my WUs were the only work for anyone to crunch, so I didn't want to make them too long in case people who typically crunch on short tasks wanted WUs to do, but couldn't sacrifice the time. Basically, it was due to the circumstances at that time. We have had a few weeks recently where I was the only one who had work for you guys, which was never a common situation for us. However, we keep adding more users, and it is becoming harder to come up with ideas fast enough (which is a good problem to have!). We are also trying to bring in new scientists!
3) Message boards : News : Donating via Amazon (Message 29935)
Posted 6 days ago by nate
Hey guys,

We've added a new way for users to donate to GPUGRID. We've set ourselves up as an Amazon Associate, and if you click the link in our donations page before making a purchase with Amazon, we'll receive some small percentage of the value of your purchase. This way you can make a donation while going about your normal purchases.

We are also considering updating the advertising banner(s) at the bottom of the page. We will likely keep it non-intrusive, non-annoying text, much as it is now. Certainly no flash animations.

As always, Thanks!
4) Message boards : Server and website : Can't upload (Message 29922)
Posted 7 days ago by nate
Sun Badger, I would try to restart your client before aborting. If it is a client issue and not the WU, you will have to deal with it again after the next WU.
5) Message boards : Number crunching : A trick (for the scientists) to fold proteins more quickly (Message 29793)
Posted 11 days ago by nate
Thanks for the link, tim. We are aware of this kind of research. We also are developing "tricks" to try to speed things up, but we are very careful about how we go about that. Using tricks can often mean you make sacrifices that can affect your results, which we attempt to avoid.

Folding@Home does folding of small proteins in implicit solvent, meaning that they do not have the water molecules present in the simulation. The implicit solvent model tries to approximate how water would probably interact and affect the protein. This works well most of the time, but it is known that it also has problems. The one clear reason for using implicit solvent is that you can simulate much faster.

Everything we do at GPUGRID involves explicit solvent, meaning we simulate the water, too. The water models we use are not perfect either, but are clearly superior to the implicit models, at least the ones they use now. Some people are working on improving implicit models, which, if they really are very good, would help us a lot.
6) Message boards : Number crunching : OpenMM (Message 29790)
Posted 11 days ago by nate
Already on our radar. If there are updates, we will post something in the news thread.
7) Message boards : Server and website : Out of Long Tasks (Message 29574)
Posted 24 days ago by nate
I have submitted new tasks to long. They are what should be the last round of NATHAN_dhfr tasks. I will also submit more stuff to short in the next day or so. In the coming weeks we should have some new and exciting stuff to send you guys also. Well, it won't be exciting until we get results we can publish, but I thought I would share some of the optimism we feel here.

Happy crunching!
8) Message boards : Number crunching : NATHAN_dhfr36 problems (Message 29497)
Posted 33 days ago by nate
Well, that's strange. Thanks for letting us know. For the most part my NATHAN workunits have been very stable and giving low errors, though I'm not sure if such issues like you have experienced would be seen in the error statistics (I'll look at that). Since crunchers have been complaining about this type of problem more often recently (meaning stuck work units), I wonder if there is some subtle issue with the app/client/driver, and not just a specific group of workunits... I'm noticing some very strange error messages in that group you linked. Hmmm...
9) Message boards : News : Current Noelia WUs (Message 29360)
Posted 44 days ago by nate
Nothing has changed with the NATHAN tasks. They have been running for weeks with historically low error rates, so they really shouldn't be a problem, as far as I can imagine. I know almost nothing at this point about the new NOELIA WUs, but I have suspended them for now considering the complaints.
10) Message boards : Graphics cards (GPUs) : Really low Run Times, but still Completed and Successful? (Message 29312)
Posted 48 days ago by nate
But, since it already happened, and it seems that there's no way the result could be valid, then you might consider seeing if you can somehow account for it now (in the validator?), instead of waiting for it to happen again.


Indeed. It appears that there is some problem. A file is missing, and the simulation may be affected. Let us know if it happens again. We'll have to figure out a way to search all the files/database and see if this is an issue elsewhere.


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