What's the typical RAM footprint of the AstroPulse application?

It seems to use around 50 MB.

About the same as the stock SETI app with graphics then.

Thanks.

AstroPulse is real, not just a test project. Note that there are projects and there are applications. Right now the SETI@home Project has one application: SETI@home. Soon it will have another: AstroPulse. So if you signed up for the SETI@home Project, you will automatically be given both kinds of workunits. We have yet to determine the ratio of SETI@home to AstroPulse work we'll be sending out.

Thank you for clarifying the AP Project for me.

On a recent TV show they said and I'm paraphrasing here that Seti@Home probably won't ever be successful because once radio signals get about a lightyear out they dissipate into the ether.

Matt what are your thoughts on the sentence above; will the project get shut down if this happens? They are discussing it here
Thanks’
Speedy

AstroPulse is real, not just a test project. Note that there are projects and there are applications. Right now the SETI@home Project has one application: SETI@home. Soon it will have another: AstroPulse. So if you signed up for the SETI@home Project, you will automatically be given both kinds of workunits. We have yet to determine the ratio of SETI@home to AstroPulse work we'll be sending out.

Thank you for clarifying the AP Project for me.

On a recent TV show they said: (and I'm paraphrasing here) that Seti@Home probably won't ever be successful because once radio signals get about a light-year out they dissipate into the ether.

Matt what are your thoughts on the sentence above; will the project get shut down if this happens? They are discussing it here
Thanks’
Speedy

"Dissipate" just means the radio signal gets fainter, not that it disappears altogether... which is why SETI is using Arecibo(sp?), the largest single radio telescope on the planet. (and, hence, the "biggest ear" for radio) Whoever said that line doesn't know radio wave physics, even to amateur radio levels... otherwise we wouldn't be detecting (via radio waves...) stars (NTM quasars and pulsars) several million light-years away!

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.

Hello, from Albany, CA!...

AstroPulse is real, not just a test project. Note that there are projects and there are applications. Right now the SETI@home Project has one application: SETI@home. Soon it will have another: AstroPulse. So if you signed up for the SETI@home Project, you will automatically be given both kinds of workunits. We have yet to determine the ratio of SETI@home to AstroPulse work we'll be sending out.

Thank you for clarifying the AP Project for me.

On a recent TV show they said: (and I'm paraphrasing here) that Seti@Home probably won't ever be successful because once radio signals get about a light-year out they dissipate into the ether.

Matt what are your thoughts on the sentence above; will the project get shut down if this happens? They are discussing it here
Thanks’
Speedy

"Dissipate" just means the radio signal gets fainter, not that it disappears altogether... which is why SETI is using Arecibo(sp?), the largest single radio telescope on the planet. (and, hence, the "biggest ear" for radio) Whoever said that line doesn't know radio wave physics, even to amateur radio levels... otherwise we wouldn't be detecting (via radio waves...) stars (NTM quasars and pulsars) several million light-years away!

I second that thought, that whoever said that has no idea about Radio wave Astronomy, several years ago I went to Jodrell Bank (large UK based Radio Telescope) this was when I was only just starting to crunch SETI data. On speaking with the Astronomers there, they wished something like this project had come about years ago.

With the scientific community looking at as many aspects of the sky as possible whether it be to look at visible, infra-red or whatever spectrum, being just a small part of this project could have HUGE implications for mankind. Scientists spend most of their time writing papers etc and get hardly any hands on chance to use the vast array of equipment available such as Arecibo or the Hubble.

Seti will be here to stay as will the other projects that use BOINC, it helps scientists immensely as they can see crunched data 10 or more times faster than they would by using just one super computer.

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Seti will be here to stay as will the other projects that use BOINC, it helps scientists immensely as they can see crunched data 10 or more times faster than they would by using just one super computer.

Not to be argumentative but the top (known) supercomputer in 2007 was the BlueGene/L, with a demonstrated LINPACK speed of 480 TFlops. The top 5 computers are each over 100 TFlops. Development in this area has proceeded along an exponential path since 1993, at least, with a projection well over 1 PTFlop in 2009. By comparison, my stock Q6700 is benchmarked at a measly 2.4 GFlops per cpu.

To estimate S@H's current capability, I figured that I would start using E@H's claimed speed of 150 TFlops. Looking at boinc stats, it appears that S@H is about 2.5x "faster" than E@H (in terms of cobblestones). So using that ratio, we, at S@H, produce an estimated speed of roughly 380 TFlops. An alternate approach, which is justified given the high degree of granularity of our application, would be to multiply the current number of active users (200K) by a "typical" cpu speed. I'll arbitrarily pick 1GFlop for the cpu speed and come up with a 200 TFlop speed, which is not far from the first estimate.

One can quibble about the estimates, but the statement of 10x faster than one super computer sounds silly.

I think the project's justification is 1) that the volunteer base provides a platform for an endeavor that cannot be scientifically justified to be done on a conventional supercomputer (which many of us, of course, probably disagree with), and 2) that we provide some computer science types a relatively inexpensive "laboratory" to develop their distributed computing ideas (boinc and derivatives) in a massive way.

Of course, these are just my perspectives and may or may not be those of management, sponsors, or advertisers.

I think the project's justification is 1) that the volunteer base provides a platform for an endeavor that cannot be scientifically justified to be done on a conventional supercomputer (which many of us, of course, probably disagree with),

I don't think that's very accurate. I think the problem is one of cost. Not every scientist can get the proper funding to afford a supercomputer, including the ongoing expense of maintenance, power and space.

I'm sure many scientists would rather have a supercomputer under their direct control and disposal. The justification of distributed computing in general is an attempt to help scientists with great ideas that might not otherwise get the proper funding through normal channels. If their ideas require massive amounts of computation, DC can be a reasonable alternative.

Seti will be here to stay as will the other projects that use BOINC, it helps scientists immensely as they can see crunched data 10 or more times faster than they would by using just one super computer.

Not to be argumentative but the top (known) supercomputer in 2007 was the BlueGene/L, with a demonstrated LINPACK speed of 480 TFlops. The top 5 computers are each over 100 TFlops. Development in this area has proceeded along an exponential path since 1993, at least, with a projection well over 1 PTFlop in 2009. By comparison, my stock Q6700 is benchmarked at a measly 2.4 GFlops per cpu.

To estimate S@H's current capability, I figured that I would start using E@H's claimed speed of 150 TFlops. Looking at boinc stats, it appears that S@H is about 2.5x "faster" than E@H (in terms of cobblestones). So using that ratio, we, at S@H, produce an estimated speed of roughly 380 TFlops. An alternate approach, which is justified given the high degree of granularity of our application, would be to multiply the current number of active users (200K) by a "typical" cpu speed. I'll arbitrarily pick 1GFlop for the cpu speed and come up with a 200 TFlop speed, which is not far from the first estimate.

One can quibble about the estimates, but the statement of 10x faster than one super computer sounds silly.

S@H 486 Tflops

Boinc Combined 1073 Tflops

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Do you Good Search for Seti@Home? http://www.goodsearch.com/?charityid=888957
Or Good Shop? http://www.goodshop.com/?charityid=888957

I think the project's justification is 1) that the volunteer base provides a platform for an endeavor that cannot be scientifically justified to be done on a conventional supercomputer (which many of us, of course, probably disagree with),

I don't think that's very accurate. I think the problem is one of cost. Not every scientist can get the proper funding to afford a supercomputer, including the ongoing expense of maintenance, power and space.

I'm sure many scientists would rather have a supercomputer under their direct control and disposal. The justification of distributed computing in general is an attempt to help scientists with great ideas that might not otherwise get the proper funding through normal channels. If their ideas require massive amounts of computation, DC can be a reasonable alternative.

[Soap Box]
You fail to understand the meaning of 'justification'. It implies economics. Given the universe of good ideas to pursue, economic capital flows to the ideas with the highest return. This is a universal truth and applies to Wall Street and to scientific endeavors, equally. It cannot be violated except in the short term as with Government intervention, which risks severe ramifications. (Low-down payment home loans is a recent credit market collapse example; the defunct supercollider in Texas is a scientific example.)

Of course, people in the aggregate and fellow scientists in the specific end up rating the ideas, based on objective and subjective factors. I assume that the scientists behind seti have submitted proposals to the standard organizations to fund its objectives; if seti remains unfunded, then the ideas do not promise sufficient reward for the risk (money from the funding organization) embraced. It is well understood that any such rating process, discounting any subjective bias by the people involved, is fundamentally flawed because it requires a crystal ball, which none of us have. So the project has two alternatives: quit or persevere until the risk/reward argument can be made more favorably. I for one am glad they have chosen the latter.

Yet, there is another aspect to this activity that many of us overlook: the seti project is a shining light of democracy. We are all here because we want to be. We contribute our Joules because we want to. We peek at our cobblestone count and that of our neighbors because competition and the accumulation of computed results is exciting us. We buy new computers because we want to keep up. Nobody is telling us we need to do this; no one is stealing our capital (money) by way of taxes to support something we don't want to support. In return for our sacrifices, seti has no task master in Washington pressuring that the wrong decisions be made. What could be better, for science and the culture. Universities should reflect on what is being demonstrated here in the modern context and consider history a bit. There was a time that universities were not so heavily dependent on Washington for their creative pursuits. Pretty much that was the case before WWII. Creative ideas florished and the world progressed. Things changed and had to accelerate after WWII due to the very real geopolitical needs and threats to our freedom. Now huge inefficient organizations dominate the Academy, each one destructively clawing for money from government to keep afloat. The publish-or-perish culture has produced a stream of mediocrity. The bureaucrats and elected representatives in Washington and state governments, who actually have very different objectives, end up directing where our efforts are applied; risk taking is unnaturally minimized. Free market capitalism is impeded, leading one to wonder how many opportunities are being sacrificed. Unfortunately, once you taste the forbidden fruit you are cast out of Eden, which is the situation today.
[/Soap Box]

Two comments: 1) Large supercomputers are capitalized and operated by organizations, frequently part of the government, as an abstract shared resource for a specific user community, and the individual scientist has little direct responsibilty or ownership. The supercomputer funding is, in fact, justified by the quality of the science that the user base chooses to address. The result is a sort of cloistered meso-economic environment where the capital flows, once again, to the 'best' ideas.

And, 2) the cost of DC is often overlooked, and may well be an UNreasonable alternative. That is, in the modern world where the cpu (and most of the entire PC) essentially turns itself off when not being used, if even for a few microseconds, there are few 'un-used cycles', which was one of the original justifications for volunteer DC on PC's. One might claim that DC is NOT green, using our politically correct modern parlance. It may not be unsavory to accept, but the proliferation of DC might be viewed as diliterious to society, viz the construction and operation of a few more supercomputers. Remember, software written for a specific architecture can be the most efficient and productive; an example of that is the AK8 science app being distrubuted now within seti.

Seti will be here to stay as will the other projects that use BOINC, it helps scientists immensely as they can see crunched data 10 or more times faster than they would by using just one super computer.

Not to be argumentative but the top (known) supercomputer in 2007 was the BlueGene/L, with a demonstrated LINPACK speed of 480 TFlops. The top 5 computers are each over 100 TFlops. Development in this area has proceeded along an exponential path since 1993, at least, with a projection well over 1 PTFlop in 2009. By comparison, my stock Q6700 is benchmarked at a measly 2.4 GFlops per cpu.

To estimate S@H's current capability, I figured that I would start using E@H's claimed speed of 150 TFlops. Looking at boinc stats, it appears that S@H is about 2.5x "faster" than E@H (in terms of cobblestones). So using that ratio, we, at S@H, produce an estimated speed of roughly 380 TFlops. An alternate approach, which is justified given the high degree of granularity of our application, would be to multiply the current number of active users (200K) by a "typical" cpu speed. I'll arbitrarily pick 1GFlop for the cpu speed and come up with a 200 TFlop speed, which is not far from the first estimate.

One can quibble about the estimates, but the statement of 10x faster than one super computer sounds silly.

S@H 486 Tflops

Boinc Combined 1073 Tflops

Duh, I can overlook the obvious can't I. Yet I love to make back of the envelope estimates, especially when they turn out to be essentially correct.

Combined top 500 supercomputers is 7 PFlops in 2007 which significantly exceeds 1Pflop of the 600,000 active hosts in boinc. It would be interesting to learn the utilization of those 500 SC's. Maybe they would run some seti cycles for us!

You fail to understand the meaning of 'justification'. It implies economics.

That's an awful offensive way to get through to someone. You mean to say that you failed to get across the alternative meaning you wanted to use for the term 'justification'. The definition I have is as follows:

Noun: justification
1. Something (such as a fact or circumstance) that shows an action to be reasonable or necessary.

2. A statement in explanation of some action or belief.

3. The act of defending or explaining or making excuses for by reasoning.

Nowhere in there does it imply economics in the way you describe. But I'll accept that it was a misunderstanding on my part based upon a lack of explanation on your part.

Given the universe of good ideas to pursue, economic capital flows to the ideas with the highest return. This is a universal truth and applies to Wall Street and to scientific endeavors, equally. It cannot be violated <sniped for brevity>

Of course, people in the aggregate and fellow scientists in the specific end up rating the ideas, based on objective and subjective factors. I assume that the scientists behind seti have submitted proposals to the standard organizations to fund its objectives; if seti remains unfunded, then the ideas do not promise sufficient reward for the risk (money from the funding organization) embraced. It is well understood that any such rating process, discounting any subjective bias by the people involved, is fundamentally flawed because it requires a crystal ball, which none of us have. So the project has two alternatives: quit or persevere until the risk/reward argument can be made more favorably. I for one am glad they have chosen the latter.

I have a problem with that philosophy that so many seem to take. I will call it the 'survival of the fittest' philosophy. The implication that people have dumb ideas all the time and that only peer reviewed ideas should get the proper funding it deserves. To some extent, there's a little truth to that.

But as you said, the system is flawed and requires people to not only have a crystal ball, but to have patience, imagination and perseverance. Unfortunately, not every idea can be pursued for a lack of any one of those three or a combination thereof. This doesn't mean the idea was "meant" to die, only that flawed humans with flawed logic deemed it unworthy.

This is where I believe DC comes in. It allows a scientist to have all three (patience, imagination and perseverance) in hopes of helping mankind with very little capital and a lot of help.

Ned

The splitter issue requiring excessive drive space has been corrected. See AP thread Additional Space needed

Regards

One reason that Seti Enhanced and Seti MultiBeam were as painless as they were is because of the group of Dedicated Volunteer Testers. It is one of the two ways you can earn the "Volunteer tester" tag. Seti Beta and BOINC Alpha.

... and I got my "tester" tag by participating in both.

Unfortunately, I'm not testing Astropulse because of the space requirement, and I'm not testing BOINC 6.2.x because it won't run on any of my machines.

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Please consider a Donation to the Seti Project.

You fail to understand the meaning of 'justification'. It implies economics.

That's an awful offensive way to get through to someone. You mean to say that you failed to get across the alternative meaning you wanted to use for the term 'justification'. The definition I have is as follows:

Noun: justification
1. Something (such as a fact or circumstance) that shows an action to be reasonable or necessary.

2. A statement in explanation of some action or belief.

3. The act of defending or explaining or making excuses for by reasoning.

Nowhere in there does it imply economics in the way you describe. But I'll accept that it was a misunderstanding on my part based upon a lack of explanation on your part.

I think even a half-wit could be more offensive than you accuse me of being. My purpose was merely to provide a reasoned reply.

Now I haven't quoted a dictionary in my writing since Mrs. Grimes' class in 7th grade, where I was promptly swatted for being mediocre. Nevertheless, following your lead, your dictionary's first entry refers to showing an action to be reasonable or necessary. This is where 'economics' is implied, as applies to the topic discussed here. Economics (here) provides the basis for concluding the action is reasonable or not.

Given the universe of good ideas to pursue, economic capital flows to the ideas with the highest return. This is a universal truth and applies to Wall Street and to scientific endeavors, equally. It cannot be violated <sniped for brevity>

Of course, people in the aggregate and fellow scientists in the specific end up rating the ideas, based on objective and subjective factors. I assume that the scientists behind seti have submitted proposals to the standard organizations to fund its objectives; if seti remains unfunded, then the ideas do not promise sufficient reward for the risk (money from the funding organization) embraced. It is well understood that any such rating process, discounting any subjective bias by the people involved, is fundamentally flawed because it requires a crystal ball, which none of us have. So the project has two alternatives: quit or persevere until the risk/reward argument can be made more favorably. I for one am glad they have chosen the latter.

I have a problem with that philosophy that so many seem to take. I will call it the 'survival of the fittest' philosophy. The implication that people have dumb ideas all the time and that only peer reviewed ideas should get the proper funding it deserves. To some extent, there's a little truth to that.

But as you said, the system is flawed and requires people to not only have a crystal ball, but to have patience, imagination and perseverance. Unfortunately, not every idea can be pursued for a lack of any one of those three or a combination thereof. This doesn't mean the idea was "meant" to die, only that flawed humans with flawed logic deemed it unworthy.

This is where I believe DC comes in. It allows a scientist to have all three (patience, imagination and perseverance) in hopes of helping mankind with very little capital and a lot of help.

I guess you aren't attacking me personally here. But to clarify my position, I am not against the Darwinian approach to science funding. It provides the best method available to allocate economic resources, whatever the source. It is fundamentally a probabilistic decision method, however, and rejects endeavors deemed least likely to succeed to the benefit of science. Flawed logic does not play a role, because there is no logical way to unambiguously predict the future or the success of a project. I was suggesting, however, that although S@H has not survived Darwin's gauntlet yet (of course a single plausible signal would change things immediately!), the S@H community has introduced a somewhat different decision process, one of pure democracy. And in that aspect it is reasonably unique and meritorious.

Moving away from unpleasentries, I have a question about the Server status page.

Since introducing the new gray "channels with errors" bar, there have been a large amount of channels with errors.

Can someone explain why this is the case, and what can be done about it?

Moving away from unpleasentries, I have a question about the Server status page.

Since introducing the new gray "channels with errors" bar, there have been a large amount of channels with errors.

Can someone explain why this is the case, and what can be done about it?

I mention this in my current thread (posted about 60 seconds ago).

- Matt

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-- BOINC/SETI@home network/web/science/development person
-- "Any idiot can have a good idea. What is hard is to do it." - Jeanne-Claude

I think even a half-wit could be more offensive than you accuse me of being. My purpose was merely to provide a reasoned reply.

You provided a 'reasoned reply', but you did not explain yourself very well.

Now I haven't quoted a dictionary in my writing since Mrs. Grimes' class in 7th grade, where I was promptly swatted for being mediocre.

From your statement below, that you "guess I'm not attacking you personally here" implies that you felt attacked personally by my response up here. Is this how you respond to what you perceive are personal attacks? Imply that one of your readers have the mentality of a seventh grader? What about others who took the same logical steps as me and couldn't see 'economics' ipmlied anywhere? Is this how you would insult your readership? I offered a dictionary explanation to let you know I full well understand the meaning of the word 'justification' and insisting that I don't was quite offensive. Amazing how one would rather lash back instead of simply acknowledging a mistake in their communications skills. Even more interesting is that you write intelligently but would rather carry on this discourse of conversation instead of trying to resolve an issue amicably.

Nevertheless, following your lead, your dictionary's first entry refers to showing an action to be reasonable or necessary. This is where 'economics' is implied, as applies to the topic discussed here. Economics (here) provides the basis for concluding the action is reasonable or not.

No, that first entry does not imply economics. "An action to be reasonable or necessary" implies a an excuse for an otherwise unreasonable or unnecessary action. Economics isn't even close to the realm of an offered implication in the definition.

I guess you aren't attacking me personally here. But to clarify my position, I am not against the Darwinian approach to science funding. It provides the best method available to allocate economic resources, whatever the source. It is fundamentally a probabilistic decision method, however, and rejects endeavors deemed least likely to succeed to the benefit of science. Flawed logic does not play a role, because there is no logical way to unambiguously predict the future or the success of a project.

Yes, I am aware that you are not against the Survival of the Fittest approach, and I agree that it is probably the best method we have to allocate our few precious resources we have. But flawed logic does play a role. Inherently we are flawed creatures incapable of perfection, so anything we do, every action we take carries with it a product of our imperfection. I agree, there is absolutely no way to predict the success of a project, but that doesn't mean that just because we don't think it will, that the idea of a project should die because of our inability to predict the future or the success of the project (any project). I can't imagine how many brilliant ideas have come and gone from great minds but were shot down because it didn't meet the approval of those governing the resources and distribution of those resources that would give the project the benefit of easy survival.

DC provides a different outlet for those who might not be able to get funding because others feel your project isn't worthy for their own lack of foresight. I see DC as an alternative to the political system that is Government and their endless cuts to scientific funding, thus giving less room for great ideas to expand simply because of fewer resources.

PS - Maybe, just maybe the thought should occur to you that if I wasn't attacking you in the latter half of my post that I probably wasn't trying to attack you at all. If I truly wanted to start a flame war (which I don't) then I would attack you through and through.

Ned

The splitter issue requiring excessive drive space has been corrected. See AP thread Additional Space needed

Regards

... and in fact I have AstroPulse work. Thanks!

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I think even a half-wit could be more offensive than you accuse me of being. My purpose was merely to provide a reasoned reply.

You provided a 'reasoned reply', but you did not explain yourself very well.

Now I haven't quoted a dictionary in my writing since Mrs. Grimes' class in 7th grade, where I was promptly swatted for being mediocre.

From your statement below, that you "guess I'm not attacking you personally here" implies that you felt attacked personally by my response up here. Is this how you respond to what you perceive are personal attacks? Imply that one of your readers have the mentality of a seventh grader? What about others who took the same logical steps as me and couldn't see 'economics' ipmlied anywhere? Is this how you would insult your readership? I offered a dictionary explanation to let you know I full well understand the meaning of the word 'justification' and insisting that I don't was quite offensive. Amazing how one would rather lash back instead of simply acknowledging a mistake in their communications skills. Even more interesting is that you write intelligently but would rather carry on this discourse of conversation instead of trying to resolve an issue amicably.

Nevertheless, following your lead, your dictionary's first entry refers to showing an action to be reasonable or necessary. This is where 'economics' is implied, as applies to the topic discussed here. Economics (here) provides the basis for concluding the action is reasonable or not.

No, that first entry does not imply economics. "An action to be reasonable or necessary" implies a an excuse for an otherwise unreasonable or unnecessary action. Economics isn't even close to the realm of an offered implication in the definition.

I guess you aren't attacking me personally here. But to clarify my position, I am not against the Darwinian approach to science funding. It provides the best method available to allocate economic resources, whatever the source. It is fundamentally a probabilistic decision method, however, and rejects endeavors deemed least likely to succeed to the benefit of science. Flawed logic does not play a role, because there is no logical way to unambiguously predict the future or the success of a project.

Yes, I am aware that you are not against the Survival of the Fittest approach, and I agree that it is probably the best method we have to allocate our few precious resources we have. But flawed logic does play a role. Inherently we are flawed creatures incapable of perfection, so anything we do, every action we take carries with it a product of our imperfection. I agree, there is absolutely no way to predict the success of a project, but that doesn't mean that just because we don't think it will, that the idea of a project should die because of our inability to predict the future or the success of the project (any project). I can't imagine how many brilliant ideas have come and gone from great minds but were shot down because it didn't meet the approval of those governing the resources and distribution of those resources that would give the project the benefit of easy survival.

DC provides a different outlet for those who might not be able to get funding because others feel your project isn't worthy for their own lack of foresight. I see DC as an alternative to the political system that is Government and their endless cuts to scientific funding, thus giving less room for great ideas to expand simply because of fewer resources.

PS - Maybe, just maybe the thought should occur to you that if I wasn't attacking you in the latter half of my post that I probably wasn't trying to attack you at all. If I truly wanted to start a flame war (which I don't) then I would attack you through and through.

Harumpf! My knees doth quake. As a moderator, you should be above this level of rant, childlike posturing, and argumentative hyperbole (look that one up in your 7th grade dictionary if you need to). Rather than stimulate more of this behavior I'll be the better man and leave this thread to you. I'd have more satisfaction discussing my points with a stone.

This all stemmed out from my over reacting comment about the super computers. Personally in the whole scheme of things while it is good for users to have opinions, what is not good is for it to go to a personal level.

It should not have got this far and while yes I know my comment was way over the top, I should have worded it better and said something like, SETI is doing the best it can on the limited resources it has and the money available.

The guys at Berkeley work incredibly hard, that is a well known fact, users crunch the data for a tiny needle in a massive haystack, who's to say a signal even exists but until it is proven otherwise, we will all keep crunching the data.

Enough with the getting personal and perhaps, ET may poke his head up sooner or later whether it be intelligent life or a small microscopic bacteria somewhere.

Keep up the good work everyone at Berkeley and users lets all get one with crunching.

This is in no way meant to heat up the posts all ready made to this thread.

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