SAMARITAN SNARE TNG Episode 43 Stardate 42779.1
The Enterprise is en route to the Epsilon Nine sector for an astronomical survey of a new pulsar cluster, when the Enterprise is hailed by the Server, a virtual
heap of disjointed technology run by the Developers, a lethargically slow race of humanoids. The Server is crippled, say the Developers (in uncertain terms)and want someone to repair their system "to make it go". Geordi beams over to the Server to fix the system, replacing both the bionic brain and the main power supply in an effort to get it moving again. When he is about to leave, Geordi is attacked by phaser and shields are raised, making it impossible to take him off the craft. Troi detects the Developers' true intentions; their system was never crippled, they simply wished to have a bargaining chip in an effort to gain access to the Enterprise's gaming systems (holodeck). The Developers are, in effect, not as stupid as they first appeared.

Trek - true science!

Troi detects the Developers' true intentions; their system was never crippled, they simply wished to have a bargaining chip in an effort to gain access to the Enterprise's gaming systems (holodeck). The Developers are, in effect, not as stupid as they first appeared.

Trek - true science!

Are you saying that Seti-developers are causing the trouble themselves, in order to make people donate money for a better performance?

No more TV for you, kiddo!
;-)

---

"Are you suggesting coconuts migrate?"

yes, make it go ... away

---

almost, however I don't think that the Developers DID anything to the system - I don't think that they have the experience or the intelligence for a project of this magnitude. and therefore they can't "make it go".

from the posts I've read they seem pretty enthusiastic and focused - very INTENSE - but its results that count and these kids are out of their depth.

not their fault however, it's the people who hired them..

---

almost, however I don't think that the Developers DID anything to the system - I don't think that they have the experience or the intelligence for a project of this magnitude. and therefore they can't "make it go".

from the posts I've read they seem pretty enthusiastic and focused - very INTENSE - but its results that count and these kids are out of their depth.

not their fault however, it's the people who hired them..

A lot of reading to do still, k&y...

Ever considered that there might not be a whole company behind the project, but _less_than_a_handful_ of staff (very experienced, BTW, it was THEM who made Seti Classic as well after all)?

:-)= Greybeard

---

All about BOINC: BOINC-Wiki (by Paul D. Buck)

yes, make it go ... away

what are you saying here SW17?
are you in a closet and the boogieman coming to eat you all up?
scared of thunder?

"make it go ... away"

lightbulb!! you live in a neighourhood where there's a nuclear reactor (which is leaking)it browns your toast but melts the butter before you can spread it.

your brain hurts..

---

almost, however I don't think that the Developers DID anything to the system - I don't think that they have the experience or the intelligence for a project of this magnitude. and therefore they can't "make it go".

from the posts I've read they seem pretty enthusiastic and focused - very INTENSE - but its results that count and these kids are out of their depth.

not their fault however, it's the people who hired them..

A lot of reading to do still, k&y...

Ever considered that there might not be a whole company behind the project, but _less_than_a_handful_ of staff (very experienced, BTW, it was THEM who made Seti Classic as well after all)?

:-)= Greybeard

well Gandalf, its seems that damage control folks like yourself are wasting your time on this project - try for a job in the Government - they can't make things go either.. but one things for sure, while something is not working you people certainly can talk-the-talk.
I wouldn't get on an airline that you guys had worked on.

don't take this post personally as it is meant in the kindest possible way, but someone must tell you (apart from Mr. Mirror) that you're out of your depth.

---

well Gandalf, its seems that damage control folks like yourself are wasting your time on this project - try for a job in the Government - they can't make things go either.. but one things for sure, while something is not working you people certainly can talk-the-talk.
I wouldn't get on an airline that you guys had worked on.

don't take this post personally as it is meant in the kindest possible way, but someone must tell you (apart from Mr. Mirror) that you're out of your depth.

1) I'm _not_ Gandalf, I'd never dare to compare to Mithrandir. But I know him well...

2) Nobody posting in here is from Seti staff. These few people are desperately struggling to keep an underfunded and understaffed project going which has been running for six years now, although it was planned to run two years. They have not the time to entertain people who have not yet understood the least of what's going on with the project.

You really should try with reading one beautiful day.

:-/= Greybeard (who will no more feed the T....)

---

All about BOINC: BOINC-Wiki (by Paul D. Buck)

watch this space

---

almost, however I don't think that the Developers DID anything to the system - I don't think that they have the experience or the intelligence for a project of this magnitude. and therefore they can't "make it go".

from the posts I've read they seem pretty enthusiastic and focused - very INTENSE - but its results that count and these kids are out of their depth.

not their fault however, it's the people who hired them..

Then pack your bags go to burkley and you fix all their problems, personaly I think they do one hell of a good job with the resorces they have.
Its people who say make it go that dont have tools to make it go.
"Rant over"

---

I think the whole debate comes back to the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". The original seti@home, now refered to as seti classic worked, and worked well. The idea of converting a beautifully working project to a multi-purpose program was ok, but, as people have said, they never had the resources to see the project fully realised. This has lead to an inability to efficiently do what we did on the old system - crunch numbers and churn out results in the search for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.

From reading the posts below, I can understand both sides of this debate, however, I think an objective and unbiased view of the overall situation is needed to move seti in the right direction. Brand loyalty, or in this case blind loyalty, does no justice to the original seti concept, and can prevent advancement of the 'cause'. Never say to yourself "it's ok, at least they mean well", because it can eventually lead to stagnation, and perhaps the demise, of what has the potential to be a fantastic project.

If it doesn't work, we *do* need to challenge the developers to keep striving to create a better project. Something akin to the original. We have to keep their passion for science and the seti project alive.

---

I think the whole debate comes back to the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". The original seti@home, now refered to as seti classic worked, and worked well.

The fact is that Classic had a lot of problems, but they were invisible to you. All that an ordinary user could see is "a workunit comes - a workunit goes".

If it doesn't work, we *do* need to challenge the developers to keep striving to create a better project.

No need. That's what they doing right now.

Something akin to the original.

Now it's already much better than original. And getting better all the time.

---

Kitty@SETI team (Russia). Our cats also want to know if there is ETI out there

I think the whole debate comes back to the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". The original seti@home, now refered to as seti classic worked, and worked well.

Depends on how you looked at it. Yes, it worked in that you could almost always download work, crunch it and upload it. However Matt has said a couple of times that seti classic could sometimes be a real pain on the back end of things which we couldn't see. A few months ago he stated that there were 50 million results awaiting validation over on classic - more than we have EVER seen over here on BOINC. But with the BOINC system we can actually SEE this number so. Also there is talk of a new receiver coming online which would have forced a redesign of the classic system anyway. So saying "classic worked therefore there is no need for BOINC" is not entirely accurate.

---

A member of The Knights Who Say NI!
For rankings, history graphs and more, check out:
My BOINC stats site

[quote]I think the whole debate comes back to the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". The original seti@home, now refered to as seti classic worked, and worked well. The idea of converting a beautifully working project to a multi-purpose program was ok, but, as people have said, they never had the resources to see the project fully realised. This has lead to an inability to efficiently do what we did on the old system - crunch numbers and churn out results in the search for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.

you seem to forget that clasic had it share of problems. I can remember many weekends spent idel because the server craped out and no one was around to kick it. It is easy to remember the good old days as "The Good Old Days" after the fact, but how easy it is to forget the growing pains and how unique we all felt, but we all paint a better picture after the fact than what we felt at the time.

---

"The fact is that Classic had a lot of problems, but they were invisible to you. All that an ordinary user could see is "a workunit comes - a workunit goes"."

And that's my point. Currently in BOINC, there are no work units "coming and going". All I see from my client is "work unit 100% complete - communication deferred." How is this model better?

"No need. That's what they doing right now."

There is a need. There aren't many people in this world that can unceasingly challenge themselves to do better all the time. Most of us need prompting and urging from others to continue to strive and push, long after we've exhausted our own reserves. Whether it's a consumer base, demanding a higher level of quality in products or services, or a business competitor that will push us out of the market if we "slack off", we still need external input to keep motivated.

"Now it's already much better than original. And getting better all the time."

I suppose that "behind the scenes" the mechanics and design of the project may be "better". But it has to actually work to effectively be better. Ie: If the new project doesn't distribute and receive works units to/from the user base, it's not better. (Similar to designing a new car, then locking the doors so a driver can't get in. The new car is "better", but noone can actually drive it.)

---

"So saying "classic worked therefore there is no need for BOINC" is not entirely accurate."

Sorry if I gave that impression. It's not exactly what I was trying to say. The point is, the new system doesn't appear to be coping with the size of the participants. We may not have 50 million unvalidated results on the new BOINC project, but that seems more likely due to the fact that people aren't being given work units, and that completed units aren't being reported, than the fact that the new system is faster at validating our results.

Heck, surely they could have done the same thing on the old system, and throttled down or choked up the distribution of work units until the delivered ones had been validated? The same way they are doing it now.

Look, maybe you can explain the validation process to me? It surely can't be a re-processing of our work units, because that would void the point of a distributed computing network. So how exactly are the WU's validated, and why aren't they being validated fast enough in BOINC to keep the WU's churning out to the participants?

Maybe a system of cross-validation could occur? Where the validation of a persons WU's can be performed randomly by other users, rather than place that strain on the BOINC servers?

I guess it's just frustrating to have a passion for the *concept* behind this project, but having to sit there and watch the new client do nothing... :)

---

"The fact is that Classic had a lot of problems, but they were invisible to you. All that an ordinary user could see is "a workunit comes - a workunit goes"."

And that's my point. Currently in BOINC, there are no work units "coming and going". All I see from my client is "work unit 100% complete - communication deferred." How is this model better?

A good question: what's better, having workunits not uploaded for 3-4 days, or having more than 50,000,000 WUs not validated? See below the right answer.

"No need. That's what they doing right now."

There is a need. There aren't many people in this world that can unceasingly challenge themselves to do better all the time. Most of us need prompting and urging from others to continue to strive and push, long after we've exhausted our own reserves. Whether it's a consumer base, demanding a higher level of quality in products or services, or a business competitor that will push us out of the market if we "slack off", we still need external input to keep motivated.

See below the right answer.

"Now it's already much better than original. And getting better all the time."

I suppose that "behind the scenes" the mechanics and design of the project may be "better". But it has to actually work to effectively be better. Ie: If the new project doesn't distribute and receive works units to/from the user base, it's not better. (Similar to designing a new car, then locking the doors so a driver can't get in. The new car is "better", but noone can actually drive it.)

The right answer. Your mistake is that you consider the project as commercial. That's why you're talking about "consumer base", "quality of service", "competitors", "motivation" etc. That's completely wrong. The only and single goal of the project is to make science. NOT to satisfy customers or to get high income. You're not a customer, you don't pay your money for the service, you didn't sign a contract. You're a volunteer. Nobody owes you anything, they didn't sign a contract either.

And for the science having 50 million unprocessed workunits of data is MUCH worse than 3-4 days of delay. Not a single unit will be lost, they will just come to the master science database a week later.

For the science having God knows how many "false" workunits (among that 50 million) due to "cheating" is MUCH worse than the present system making cheating almost impossible.

And so on, I could continue.

Now you see?

---

Kitty@SETI team (Russia). Our cats also want to know if there is ETI out there

I believe I understand that issues we are having with drop connections is that everyone in the World is trying at the same time upload results?

I don't know if this would work or not, but if that is the issue we have over 230 countries and around 310000 users. I have listed the top 12 counties below (based on number of users), could we put each country in time frame that only that country can upload results, for that one hour And everyone else put there BOINC network activity suspended until its there turn. Within 24 hours we have a greater opportunity to upload results.

Who first, here is some information on number of users by country (from BOINCStats, thanks willy). I only listed those over 2000 users. It is in order by UTC offset.

Users Percent of All Users UTC Time Offset

USA 115015 46.5% -9 Alaska
Canada 14312 5.8% -8
USA -8 Eastern
USA -5 Mountain
USA -6 Central
USA -5 Washington
United Kingdom 24504 9.9% 0
Austria 8501 3.4% 1
Czech Republic 4482 1.8% 1
France 10690 4.3% 1
Germany 37786 15.3% 1
Poland 7377 3.0% 1
Spain 7356 3.0% 1
Sweden 4253 1.7% 1
China 3589 1.5% 8
Japan 9238 3.7% 9
total from above 247103 total World users 309989

I know this doesnt include number of workstation by user by country, and will we all try this.
Maybe another way, easier just before you go to bed, click on network activity suspended, and when you awake from you sleep, turn backon network activity always active.

Should we explore this possibility?

I thinking outside the box, way out of the box, LOL

---

BOINC SYNERGY is an International Team and We Welcome All BOINC Participants!
BOINC Synergy Click to Join BOINC Synergy

Then pack your bags go to burkley and you fix all their problems, personaly I think they do one hell of a good job with the resorces they have.
Its people who say make it go that dont have tools to make it go.
"Rant over"
[/quote]

coupla things here coolbreeze, you're souding a bit like Gandalf in your blind passionate defence of a team who can't cut the mustard on the project.

your "piss off" response, is that the most intelligent thing you could think of? why not focus on a solution instead of getting personal and closed minded. Haven't you been reading the other posts? There are real concerns about this underachievement. If you really cared about seti as we do, you would address the ISSUES..

those genuine volunteers want to make it go.

you should too.

---

coupla things here coolbreeze, you're souding a bit like Gandalf in your blind passionate defence of a team who can't cut the mustard on the project.

you should too.

First, if you want to be taken seriously, don't give people nicknames that they aren't appreciative of. Calling Greybeard "Gandalf" after he asked you not to isn't very kind. Doing so may cause people to become aggrevated - and that does no good for trying to communicate with anyone. If you want to communicate, then be respectful. If you want a flame war, then keep your current path, and one can only hope that the mods would delete your posts - not for content but intent. Please, stay on track.

Second, you want to say that BOINC has failed because they are having issues? You think they are "in too deep" and that it's never going to work?

How many times in the past of humanity has this always been the case? How many times have people looked at something prematurely and said "it'll never work, they're doing it all wrong" when those people don't have all the facts, or wisdom to put those facts to use.

I can appreciate your wanting the "spirit" of the project to live on, but patience is the biggest virue one could have. Do you not think, in even the slightest possibility that you're being premature in judgement? Have you never had a project that works in theory, but on paper doesn't seem to go quite well, but you have the willpower to keep tweaking it until it works close to your original design? That is BOINC.

I'm sure they're original plans have been changed many times and their path has curved through many obstacles, but, with the human mind, anything is possible and as long as you have the mindset that we can do anything... make anything work, then you should know that scrapping BOINC would be a bigger waste than making suggestions to improve the software.

If you have an old house (SETI Classic) that is dated and not really doing it's job anymore, so you decide to build a new one next to it (SETI-BOINC) with more technology built into it, and this technology is difficult to learn (perhaps just at first), do you simply scrap the whole house? Or should you keep tweaking it to make it work?

The answer depends on one's perspective. I'm sure, as adament as you are, you'll take the former path and just build an easy house to live in, even if it's not energy efficient, not very well protected from criminals, etc. but at least it's easy to live in. Which is fine, that's why choices are the most beautiful thing we have as humans.

But many believe that BOINC is ok, can become better, and is doing a good job besides their current server problems. This is the path the developers have choosen (again, choices!), and this is one that many are ok with. You can make the judgement that they're in over their heads all you want, but without actually being there, you can only assume by piecing parts of a puzzle together without a finished peice to compare to. Sometimes, the pieces might look like one thing, but is completely different from what you expected.

It's not blind so be ok with BOINC, anymore than it's blind to prefer something more simple. But it's the path that was taken, and the choice is yours to stay with that path, or you can come up with something on your own.

Sorry if my above analogies aren't 100% accurate, but neither was yours - but they still make a clear point.

BOINC does "go". Just not the direction some people want it to.

---