WCGrid News and Talking Points!!

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

I do wonder how many researchers are sat there looking at all the data that we (TPU) and the rest of the teams submit.. I mean there's literally thousands, if not a million or so of results returned each day.. Compare this back to when I first started in 2007 with single core CPUs, my world how things have moved on. I can crunch what I did in 2007/2008 in a year in a day with the hardware I have working now. How scary is that??

Folding @ home is similar, i think it took me a few years to get to a million points yet that's a day flat out now.
My first foray into wcg was with my old trusty q6600 now i have 12 cores at it with my dream of a 32 core monster ,soon it could be much more since this chip would then be my server chip (12 core +32)yay.

 

[phill]

I must admit now with Ryzen, they are monsters Two running at the moment, can't fault it. Fans are quiet, temps are reasonably good for the air coolers I'm using and what more could I ask for in a cruncher? Some of the earlier work units I was doing the wattage meter read 125w at best for a full system and that's 16 threads.. Now it's a little higher, 155w but still better than my 6700k and E3-1245v3 together as they are only 8 threads each

 

[Arjai]

Meet Your Fellow Volunteer Computing Enthusiasts at the BOINC Workshop 2019

19 Feb 2019

Summary
We're excited host this year's BOINC Workshop in Chicago, Illinois, USA. If you're reading this, you're part of the BOINC community and we'd like to meet you.

It's almost that time of year again...the 13th annual BOINC Workshop is happening from July 9 to July 12, and registration is now open. This year, the workshop is being hosted by World Community Grid in IBM's Chicago offices.

Attendees to the 2019 workshop are invited to give a 15-30 minute presentation about the work they are doing with BOINC.

All scientists, project administrators, developers, volunteers, and anyone with an interest in volunteer computing will be welcome to attend. Past BOINC Workshops have covered topics such as presentations on the science supported by BOINC projects, ideas for future development, how GDPR may affect the ways that BOINC projects handle data, and suggestions for simplifying volunteer registration. You can see all of the presentations from last year's workshop here, and listen to audio from the workshop here.

At the workshop, attendees will have the opportunity to learn what other attendees are doing with BOINC software and volunteer computing, learn about what has happened with BOINC since the last workshop, participate in a hackfest where we attendees team up to solve some challenges, and get to know others in the community.

Registration is free. We'll update the BOINC Workshop 2019 page as more information becomes available, but in the meantime feel free to ask any question in the workshop forum thread.

See you in Chicago!

This just a repost that showed up in my 'Notices'. But is a reminder to Register and attend. I am more than likely going to attend. I am thinking of Registering next week when my Holiday time is approved.

 

[Arjai]

Volunteer opportunities in BOINC for Mac Developers


26 Mar 2019

Summary
Are you a Mac developer? The team of volunteers supporting BOINC is looking for experienced Mac developers to help support and maintain the software that World Community Grid and other distributed computing projects depend on for scientific research.

The Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC) is an open-source software platform that makes projects like World Community Grid possible. BOINC, which is maintained by a team of volunteer developers, is searching for Mac experts who are willing to volunteer alongside them. This is a chance for volunteer computing enthusiasts with Mac development skills to contribute to the development and maintenance of a crucial program.

Tasks include monitoring BOINC developer email lists and GitHub list for reports of Mac-related issues, investigating and resolving issues, and creating builds of the BOINC Mac client for testing and distribution.

The Whole Post, including "Skills Needed" and links to the application...

HERE.

 

[Arjai]

"FightAIDS@Home Team's New Simulation Technique Published in Industry Journal

"

To be updated on Thursday the 2nd...I have been working a ton, been extremely worn out, but, I have the afternoon off on Thursday. (Yea!)

Stay tuned...

 

[Arjai]

FightAIDS@Home Team's New Simulation Technique Published in Industry Journal


22 Apr 2019


Summary
The FightAIDS@Home - Phase 2 team teamed up with World Community Grid to examine and refine the results of Phase 1 of the project. Over the past 18 months, they've created a new technique called asynchronous replica exchange, which drastically increases the effectiveness of their computations and may have implications for other researchers who use the same software for drug discovery. The results of this work were recently published in the Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling.

​

Computer-based experiments in drug discovery require accurate and highly detailed simulations of molecular interactions. Unfortunately, conventional computing resources, even high-performance computer clusters like World Community Grid, often cannot provide the level of detail on these complex interactions to make them as accurate as scientists need to further their work. Similarly, World Community Grid's computing resources are enormous, but its basic design was not a perfect fit for the particular molecular simulation techniques that the FightAIDS@Home scientists were using.

For more than 18 months, the research team worked closely with World Community Grid developers Keith Uplinger and Jonathan Armstrong to create and test asynchronous replica exchange, a new sampling protocol which provides very fine-grained dynamic molecular simulations. Asynchronous replica exchange, which is detailed in a paper recently published by the research team, could have implications for future work in drug discovery for scientists who use the same software for computer simulations.

You can read the abstract of the paper here. Thanks to everyone who is donating computing time to support FightAIDS@Home.

Keith and Jonathon, super stars working out the answers to FAH's issues! Another step towards ridding this Planet of the AIDS!!

 

[Arjai]

Student and Teacher Become First Volunteers to Visit Mapping Cancer Markers Research Team

16 May 2019

Summary
In a first for World Community Grid, high school student Dylan Bucci and teacher Robert Esposito recently traveled to Toronto to meet the scientists running the Mapping Cancer Markers project at Krembil Research Institute. This is the first time World Community Grid volunteers have ever visited a research institution to meet with scientists who use the program.

In mid-January, Dylan Bucci, a sophomore at Sisler High School in Winnipeg, Canada, finished reconfiguring twelve high-end servers to provide computing power for the Mapping Cancer Markers project, which uses World Community Grid to accelerate the search for cancer biomarkers.
By early May, Bucci and Sisler High School teacher Robert Esposito, who guided Dylan’s work, were headed to Toronto to meet the Mapping Cancer Markers research team at the Krembil Research Institute. There, they spent the day with scientists to see first-hand how volunteer computing contributes to the fight against cancer.

​

“This visit has gotten me thinking about the many options someone can have with a tech background,” says Bucci. “And a major highlight was getting to meet Dr. Jurisica. Talking to him was so uplifting, and he explained his research so well.”
“There’s not a lot of interdisciplinary study on science and technology at the high school level, and there’s a huge need for it,” adds Esposito. “World Community Grid—and this visit—is something that can help a student literally see the integration between the two. It can also help them feel that they’re a part of something bigger than themselves.”

Click here to see a CTV Toronto News video about their visit.

More of this story, HERE

 

[Arjai]

Help Stop TB Team Continues Learning and Searching

By: Dr. Anna Croft
University of Nottingham, UK
18 Jun 2019

Summary
While the Help Stop TB researchers continue the search for new team members, they are also learning from the data they receive from World Community Grid.

Rest of story, HERE.

Sorry for the short posting...I have been working 7 days a week, 13 hours a day, since the 4th.

 

[phill]

Help Stop TB Team Continues Learning and Searching

By: Dr. Anna Croft
University of Nottingham, UK
18 Jun 2019

Summary
While the Help Stop TB researchers continue the search for new team members, they are also learning from the data they receive from World Community Grid.

Rest of story, HERE.

Sorry for the short posting...I have been working 7 days a week, 13 hours a day, since the 4th.

Understandable mate but you need rest and to take care of yourself, don't burn yourself out But on the other hand, it will help pay for the electric on the crunching

 

[Arjai]

Understandable mate but you need rest and to take care of yourself, don't burn yourself out But on the other hand, it will help pay for the electric on the crunching

I work on Salary...I'd be very wealthy if I were hourly!!

 

[phill]

I work on Salary...I'd be very wealthy if I were hourly!!

That's a shame, so I'd consider asking for a pay rise if you're doing that many hours!! Give yourself a break mate

 

[Boatvan]

I work on Salary...I'd be very wealthy if I were hourly!!

I hate when employers exploit salaried workers for free overtime. Luckily I work somewhere that respects this, but generally techies are expected to work free overtime if needed. Seems to be in the culture of this field.

 

[Peter1986C]

Free overtime is against the law here, afaik.

 

[Arjai]

Just got here to the workshop, here in Chicago. There will be a live stream starting in about an hour.

Here is the YouTube link

P.S. Just met Keith Uplinger (sp?) from WCG.

Edit: Lunch break update David Wallom, CPDN, Weather@Home, OpenIFS@Home and Shawn Kwang, Einstein@Home and Keith, WCG have all had interesting presentations. This afternoon another couple of presenters and a interactive Intro to Design Thinking: Volunteer Challenges & Opportunities.

Tonight, we are gathering at Goirdano's for some Chicago Deep Dish 'Za!

I will do my best to update w/ some interviews and info on presentations, later tonight.

Sitting at the bar, at Giordano's. Meetup with the workshop group, for dinner, isn't for another hour. Rather than train back to the hotel, during rush hour, then back, 2 blocks from IBM, I will hang out here and try to NOT to get drunk!

 

[phill]

I hope you have a great time @Arjai !! Take care and post up whatever you can when you get back, it'll be great to hear all about it

 

[Arjai]

Ok, to start, Chicago is just as much fun as always. If you like the urban bustle, Chicago is more Midwestern than the craziness of NYC, which is fun but, in a much different vein.

The Workshop.

The turnout, today was about half the number of sign ups. About 36 attendees, from all over. Germany, UK and Italy, were all there. Texas, Atlanta, NY and me, Minnesota. I almost forgot about Beijing, with 2 attendees.

Introduction was done with Juan (jew-ann) Hindo and Erica Tuttle. Both with IBM Chicago and member's of the BOINC team there.

Keith Uplinger, with WCG and PMC Chair with BOINC, spoke about the state of the Community and about the Contributes meetings (more about that, when I get back).

David Wallom, from ClimatePrediction.net, spoke about climate change and the contributions from Weather@Home, OpenIFS@Home and the original CPDN. He spoke about the problems they face with storage of data and the issue of member retention (one of the main subject's of the workshop).

Shawn Kwang, Einstien@Home, described their mission and what they track. Astrophysical signals, Pulsar Searches and LIGO, dealing with gravitational waves. I found this interesting, personally, due to a young woman I know from the local Speedway. She is studying astrophysics. I mentioned to her that I would here and tried to explain what BOINC is and what we do at WCG. She was fascinated and exclaimed, 'I love science'. I think Einstien@Home would be right up her alley, so to speak.

Germany Massulo, from Italy, with CERN, gave a general overview of LHC@Home. He is new, 3 months old, with CERN, so he was not as knowledgeable about the BOINC needs of CERN. He did speak about being introduced to WCG, and BOINC, by his father as a young boy. Which fostered his interest in Science.

Eric Korpela, SETI@Home, talked about what they are doing to search for ET transmissions and the evolution of the process and the issues they face with a new site coming online.

Steven Clark, with Nano@Home, spoke about NanoHub.org. One can visit the site and use their 600+ tools to run an experiment or simulation that is solved with BOINC workunits. They also use 5 other platforms, due to the specific tool needs. About 300 tools online use BOINC, running WU's that have runtimes in the seconds up to a week!

After Lunch, we worked with Evan Starkweather and Rafeal Hernandez-Chavez. They are IBM-er's and they introduced us to a version of Design Thinking. It deals with problem solving using a model developed at Stanford. We worked through some collaborative exercises using tools that are hard to describe. Essentially, creating a personal, using it as a base of thought both empathically and literally. Creating thoughts and feelings for the persona and then approaching that persona with BOINC.

The upshot I came away with is all 6 teams had a focus of ease of use for new user's. Also, we all had a secondary focus result, dealing with promotional ideas for BOINC. Tomorrow, we are to use these tools for a Brainstorming session.

There will be another Live Stream at 9 central time zone 1 and 3pm CT. Use the same link as posted above. We had 20 viewers today. I like to think many of them were TPU-er's that read my earlier posting!

Tomorrow' agenda...

Should be interesting. I spoke with Jonathan tonight at dinner.

 

[phill]

Thanks for the update Arjai I hope you're having a blast

 

[mstenholm]

Not the kind of news that @Arjai normally post here but this is from the 8th of July and is about OpenZika jobs and of intresst for mobile phone plus Linux cruncher

Re: Likely pause in work available​

Hi all,

We had another conference call with the research team today. The prerequisite tasks for the new batches are progressing slower than expected. The current updated estimate is for new work to be available 1-2 weeks from now. Thank you all for your patience.

Seippel

 

[phill]

Where's the new to @mstenholm ? Do you have a link at all please?

 

[mstenholm]

Where's the new to @mstenholm ? Do you have a link at all please?

Here you are

 

[phill]

Do they have a new thread of downtime etc? I couldn't see much on it before.. I take it its in the forums than on the main page?

 

[Arjai]

OK, Day 2 of the BOINC Workshop...

Angelo Koutsogiannis. He works for Honeywell and has developed over 60 apps on the Apple store. His main topic was crunching on NUCS and Compute sticks. He talked about the power consumption, 10 watts and 5 watts of the NUCS and Compute Sticks. Their cost's and the ease of use, along with temperatures. He lives in Arizona and and was concerned with the temps his Apple 8 core and 6 core computers vs. the tiny Nuc's and sticks.

He also pushed for the Boinc developer's to work with Apple to break the wall and make it useable on iOS.

Patrick Schofer, with SETI, talked about retention vs. recruitment. Which is a better focus. He made a point about the cost of running BOINC vs. other hobbies and the benifit of acknowledging the small contributors and using better communication in forums.

Something this team is good at, thanks to the Daily Numbers and Milestones, currently run by @phill , and all the other teammates before him that posted on those threads.

Kevin Reed, IBM WCG, spoke about the Client updates and the need for more 'Contributers'. They are volunteers that help develop and fix the releases. I will be posting more regarding the help they need in another post, or post's in other threads.

The latest update, 7.14.2 was in Oct. 18. It was the first Linux update, in some time and included auto attach for Windows. Meaning, on a new installation, after log in it will attach you to the project and team automatically.

The next release is due in a couple of weeks. It will be an update for Android, big one for Android, and fixes for Windows and Linux. Number 7.16.

There was a Server Update, detailing the steps involved with Server Updates, by Germano Mussulo.

Giuseppe Aceto, a designer from Italy, outlined a new interface for developer's and a new user experience via a designed user interface, making it simpler to use.

He also is designing tools for projects to use to simplify their updates and websites. He is looking for marketing and designer help.

He can be reached at iamgiuseppeacetto@gmail.

He works with a number of Italian firms, including Ducati and Ferrari.

Andy Bowers outlined some research on Heat and Power Use of the BOINC manager. The research was done at a company with 2 rooms, equal size and equal number of identical computers. One room had BOINC, the other, did not. The peak temp was recorded on a hot day, with no WU:s running. So, despite the attempt, I think it was inconclusive.

Then, Johnathon Starr, jringo@gridcoin.world. He was recorded so I could post more about him and his ideas. Essentially, he, and the other presenter's (Max and Alex, gridcoin programmers, Jason Lee, BOINC Planet www.Boinc.io, from China and John Heeter, Boid.com) talked about Crypto Currency as an incentive to recruit and retain new Crunchers. All of them have succeeded in different ways and through different avenues. I will be posting more about this subject, in a different thread, later.

 

[Arjai]

Day 3 of the BOINC Workshop.

Today was an all day Hack-a-thon. We broke up into groups, by subject's. 1 session in the morning and another in the afternoon.

My morning session was about making BOINC easier to use for new user's. Giuseppe was tasked with doing some research with subject's with no knowledge of BOINC. I proposed that his research be posted in the Boinc forums then implemented either before, or at the next Workshop.

The afternoon was spent talking about recruitment and retention of new user's. With the majority of attendees being project managers and developer's their were just 2 of us as simply volunteer Crunchers. We talked about our experience, mine revolving around TPU, and Mark's, the other Cruncher, experience as a solo user. He would like more WCG involvement with the Crunchers, essentially letting him know his work is appreciated. I told him I my needs were fulfilled by my membership with this team. I mentioned that he should find or create a team.

I am most excited by the work that Giuseppe will be doing. I will also be posting more about that, when I am back home, next week.

Boinc is in need of 'Contributers' that can help build fixes and upgrades to the BOINC manager. I will be posting more about that, also.

Tomorrow a River Walk is planned as the final activity. Sat, I will be travelling home. Sunday I may start posting, if time permits, more on the above subject, and include links to the post's in the member's thread.

It seems likely the next Workshop will be back in Europe, this being the first US Workshop. When the location is announced, I may have to start a GoFundMe page! My current employment does not pay enough for a week in Europe. I may have to start putting money away, next week!

 

[Arjai]

200,000 Newly Predicted Protein Structures and Counting: The Microbiome Immunity Project's Plans for the Future

By: Tomasz Kosciolek, PhD UC San Diego Center for Microbiome Innovation 23 Jul 2019

Summary
The Microbiome Immunity Project has led to the prediction of almost 200,000 unique protein structures (so far), and the project has gone international. Learn more in this video update.

​

Dear World Community Grid Volunteers,

As of July 2019, you’ve donated close to 70,000 CPU years to the Microbiome Immunity Project, which helped us to predict almost 200,000 unique protein structures!

​

​

Total Transcript of video, is HERE.

Awesome!!

 

[Arjai]

Stockholm Science & Innovation School Competition Donates 25 Years of Computing Time to Cancer and Microbiome Research

15 Aug 2019

Summary
A high school in Sweden chose to support Mapping Cancer Markers and the Microbiome Immunity Project during a one-month competition between five World Community Grid teams. Here’s what they learned during the process.

​

Read the full post, HERE.