Posts by Steven Pletsch

1) Message boards : Cafe MilkyWay : No forum is complete without funny Cat pictures (other funny pics allowed too) (Message 12311) Posted 22 Feb 2009 by Steven Pletsch Post:
2) Message boards : Application Code Discussion : milkyway code license (Message 8660) Posted 19 Jan 2009 by Steven Pletsch Post: A good source for licenses http://www.opensource.org/licenses/category
3) Message boards : Number crunching : And if we DONT run a "FASTER" App.? (Message 5983) Posted 6 Nov 2008 by Steven Pletsch Post: We all joined because of the science in the first place right? Very wrong! I don't know of anyone that can honestly say "I joined Boinc because I wanted to beat everyone else at how many points I can collect." Then maybe your not really looking, I know many. I can understand and respect the reasons the "science first" types, but I just can't understand why so many of them refuse to give the same respect and understanding to the competative crunchers, after all the work we do is just as helpfull to the project. Fair enough, if this is the motivation, than the system of credits has some value to attract those who wish to compete for credits alone. Though it should be pointed out that the system has never been fair, and probably never will be. Your effort is appreciated just as much as others, if not more so because of the volume you contribute. Thank you for pointing this out, and I will keep it in mind for future posts. I honestly never considered this being a persons sole motivation, since to me anyways, the credits have never represented a tangible value. If this is your motivation, I would also suggest investing in some CUDA compatible graphics cards, as some cards can produce easily 10,000 - 20,000 credits/day. They are significantly cheaper than the computers required to obtain that output, and will probably grow to be more widely supported by projects in the coming year.
4) Message boards : Number crunching : Daily WU limits per core (Message 5957) Posted 5 Nov 2008 by Steven Pletsch Post: hmm, it had the problem before the errors, not sure why so many errors popping up all of a sudden, that's a recent development.
5) Message boards : Number crunching : Daily WU limits per core (Message 5951) Posted 5 Nov 2008 by Steven Pletsch Post: On most of my hosts the limit is 300 WU/day per core, however on one machine it is 101 WU/day per core http://milkyway.cs.rpi.edu/milkyway/show_host_detail.php?hostid=37037 I'm not sure why this one has a lower limit, perhaps the app treats 64 bit machines differently? Anyway, I was just curious if this is something that could be easily remedied, as I am hitting the 404 WU quota fairly quickly, even with other projects attached to this machine.
6) Message boards : Number crunching : And if we DONT run a "FASTER" App.? (Message 5917) Posted 4 Nov 2008 by Steven Pletsch Post: I just wanted to drop in with my 2 cents on this issue About the optimized application First off, you can't fault anyone for choosing to run an optimized application, whether they are doing it for the credits, or to produce more work. I think Milksop has done a great service to this project by releasing the application, if it were not for his(or her, i don't know) generosity, this application would not be available in the first place. So many thanks Milksop for your the effort you put into advancing the science of this project. I for one, and I know many other truly appreciate your hard work! Second, you cannot fault the developers for an inefficient application being run before. Applications such as this one are difficult to write, and for someone that does not fully know all the tricks and the ideal coding methods it can be a daunting task. Anyone who complains about it should sit down, open their favorite text editor and write a better one, or keep their mouth shut. Again many thanks to Milksop for taking the time to write a better one, very few would do the same, whether they knew how or not. About the credits All this squabbling about doing the bare minimum to get the most credits is pretty disturbing. You should all be happy to get what you can, and leave it at that. If you are running a stock application, than I do not think that the credits should change, but that's not my decision to make. The optimized application is great, and is significantly increasing the amount of work being done on this project. Since the application is public, that makes the choice for the project administrators a bit more difficult, but ultimately it is the science which benefits from this. If the administrators choose to implement a per core, per hour limit, it is their project, and their choice. Those who hit that limit, should be grateful that they have the opportunity to contribute so much. We all joined because of the science in the first place right? I know a lot of people get caught up in their rank, position, credits, etc. But seriously, think back and ask yourself, why are you contributing in the first place? If there were no stats, and no credits, most of us would probably still be here. I like to see credits, I think it's great to see how you compare with the rest of the world. But I don't take it too seriously, I've run projects that grant 50 credits a day, and some that grant 5000 credits a day, on the same machine, same resource share, same everything. Heck I've even run a couple that grant nothing. While cross project comparison is fun, it is not, and has never been fair. I guess the point I'm trying to get to is: "Be grateful for what you get, and don't sweat the details, or people may think your are trying to compensate for your shortcomings elsewhere." DA will never come out and complain about the project granting 3 credits per hour (Superlink used to), or 1 credit per WU (Current scheme for Ramsey), or 0 credit at all (several alpha and beta projects). Choose whatever projects you want, but don't take things so seriously. I don't know of anyone that can honestly say "I joined Boinc because I wanted to beat everyone else at how many points I can collect." I'm personally only running this project for a few days, tonight, or tomorrow morning I will detach, and probably not return. It's nothing to do with the credits, I just like to contribute a specific amount of work to different types of projects and then leave to move on to the next one. Whether there is an optimized application or not, I would have done the same, the only difference is that it probably would have taken longer. Either way, whether I did it last month, or this month, the amount of work done for that number of credits would have been exactly the same, perhaps even less with the unoptimized app since I'm hitting the wall on the machines I have attached right now. I don't care about the limit, and will continue to let them crunch until the goal is hit, or the server blows up from getting slammed by 3000 hosts per minute. Sorry for the rant, but I've seen this discussion now on a dozen different projects, and it's always the same. Everyone is quick to say "I don't care about credits" and follow it up with "but they are getting too much" or "I'm getting screwed by ..." I'm waiting for the project, that just pays Claimed Credit^5 and refuses to cave in to pressure to change it. It's not far off, and will show just how pointless this whole argument is. P.S. Perhaps the admins would consider just granting claimed credit until the whole mess is sorted, then I, and everyone else running the optimized app, will get the 1 or so credits per WU we are claiming, and those with the non-optimized app will get whatever their computers think they deserve.
7) Message boards : Number crunching : Faster application (links inside) (Message 5845) Posted 3 Nov 2008 by Steven Pletsch Post: Just wanted to chime in, and say awesome work on the application!