roncli.com blog

For the past several years, I've been running Berkeley's Seti@Home, a grid computing application that searches for extraterrestrial life. It's out there, just trust me.

Anyway, since being put under the BOINC system, I've managed to compile a list of 41 projects that my computers can crunch numbers with. Naturally, my servers all host a BOINC client service, and I'm particularly controlling over which projects get time. Basically, I set it up so that I'm hitting a particular goal as to how many percent of the users in each project I'm doing better than. That current goal is 80%, although projects like Seti@Home are pushing the mid 90's.

The big problem has been controlling all of these servers, which used to be a pain. Then I found BoincView. I've only been using it for a couple of days, but what it does is it gives me a look at all of the computers that are running BOINC at once. I have the same control I can get with the BOINC Manager application that comes with the client, but since it all operates over the network, that means I can take care of all of the tasks I need to do, such as switching project work requests off and on, from one computer.

It's currently in development, so the project continues to get support and more features as it goes along. And the best part is that it's free software! Not a bad replacement for the BOINC Manager either, but if you have multiple computers you run BOINC on, this tool's invaluable.

Labels: BOINC, BoincView, SETI@Home, Software