Let me start off by saying that I'm absolutely new to Ubuntu and Linux. What I know about the subject will fit on the head of a push-pin.

A couple of weeks ago it was suggested to me that I create a couple of Virtual Box machines to run BOINC. I'm not new to Virtual Box, just didn't want BOINC on the Windows virtual machines I have and decided to give Ubuntu a try. I found a Long Term Support version (14.04) and a current version (14.10 until tomorrow when 15.04 is released). I set up two, one version 14.04 LTS and one version 14.10. The machines both run great.

I used the Ubuntu Software Center to install BOINC on both machines and attached to Seti@home. Both downloaded WUs and started running. I noticed that the Ubuntu 14.04 machine installed BOINC Manager 7.2.42 and the Ubuntu 14.10 machine installed BOINC Manager 7.4.8. I noticed that the 7.4.8 manager does not refresh on its own. I have to go from the Tasks tab to any other tab and then back to Tasks to see an update on progress. While I'm pretty sure that underneath the GUI 7.4.8 is doing its job, I like the fully functional 7.2.42 GUI better. The problem is that I don't seem to be able to get there, Ubuntu 14.10 does not give me an option to install the BOINC recommended version.

I did some searching, uninstalled 7.4.8 and tried sudo apt-get install boinc=7.2.42. Not found. Used apt-cache policy boinc on the 14.04 machine and found the version is called 7.2.42-dfsg-1. Tried sudo apt-get install boinc=7.2.42-dfsg-1 on the 14.10 machine. Not found. Reinstalled using sudo apt-get install boinc and got the 7.4.8 version again. At least it's running, but I'd really like to install 7.2.42. How?

Welcome to a taster of Linux!

Such as boinc is usually a low priority for those contributing to make up the collection of software that makes a full distro of which Ubuntu is just one.

Looking on the package listing for boinc + Ubuntu suggests there's usually only the current version of boinc packaged up for each distro release...

If there's some irritating bug, then you can bet there'll soon be a follow-up version!

Try asking on the Ubuntu forums?


Happy cool crunchin,
Martin

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See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

On my Ubuntu Hosts I just use the Berkeley version and place it in my home folder. If you want a different version you can find one here, BOINC 7.2/7.3/7.4 Change Log and News. If you use the Berkeley version you want to uninstall the repository version. You also have to manually set the Execute Bit in Permissions and track down any dependencies. Use the Terminal with the ldd command on the binaries and paste the name of what's missing into the Synaptic Package Manager. The newer versions are pretty good at not needing any extra installs though.

It's nice having the Entire BOINC package in your Home folder, and the only drawback is you might have to manually launch the boincmgr.

Can you not copy the boincmgr from 7.2.42 over 7.4.8? BOINC Manager is just the GUI interface to BOINC & doesn't have to match the version of BOINC itself.
Personally I'm sticking with BOINC Manager 6.10.48 to retain the messages tab. Rather than have to open the "Event Log" view that is used in newer versions.

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SETI@home classic workunits: 93,865 CPU time: 863,447 hours
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Can you not copy the boincmgr from 7.2.42 over 7.4.8? BOINC Manager is just the GUI interface to BOINC & doesn't have to match the version of BOINC itself.
Personally I'm sticking with BOINC Manager 6.10.48 to retain the messages tab. Rather than have to open the "Event Log" view that is used in newer versions.

Very good idea and something I've done on odd occasions...

The problem for someone new to a Linux system is where to put the binary from Berkeley and how to make the boinc GUI auth work... Any howto notes anywhere?... If the cruncher is game?...


Happy cool crunchin,
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

Can you not copy the boincmgr from 7.2.42 over 7.4.8? BOINC Manager is just the GUI interface to BOINC & doesn't have to match the version of BOINC itself.
Personally I'm sticking with BOINC Manager 6.10.48 to retain the messages tab. Rather than have to open the "Event Log" view that is used in newer versions.

Very good idea and something I've done on odd occasions...

The problem for someone new to a Linux system is where to put the binary from Berkeley and how to make the boinc GUI auth work... Any howto notes anywhere?... If the cruncher is game?...


Happy cool crunchin,
Martin

You can use the 'whereis' command to tell you where the executable is stored. ie 'whereis boinccmd'

One thing you could try is download the boinc 7.2.42 package from the 10.04 repository or install disk and use your package manager to try and install it and see if the newer 14.10 Ubuntu will let it install.

The other alternative is go forward rather than backwards, add the locutusofborg-ppa:

https://launchpad.net/~costamagnagianfranco/+archive/ubuntu/locutusofborg-ppa

Claggy

Wow! In 18 hours I've seen 6 responses on this forum. On the Ubuntu help forum I've seen 0 responses in 48 hours. I guess they just don't know BOINC.

Copying boinc-manager 7.2.42 didn't work. Apparently there are other library files needed and I'm not comfortable that copying them won't affect something else.

I copied the three 7.2.42 package files from the other machine, uninstalled 7.4.8 and installed 7.2.42 by double-clicking on the packages individually. boinc-manager didn't run, probably the same reason as above.

I suppose I could download the source files and compile, but as a new Ubuntu user I'm just not there yet.

Ubuntu 15.04 came out today. I'm going to upgrade and see if they have a non-buggy version of BOINC available.

In the meantime, thanks for all the suggestions. I'll post again after the upgrade is complete.

Upgraded the 14.10 box to 15.04. BOINC upgraded from 7.4.8 to 7.4.23 but the problem with BOINC Manager persists.

I created a second 14.04 LTS box and installed BOINC. Version 7.2.42 runs great.

I created a new 15.04 box and installed BOINC. Version 7.4.23 BOINC Manager still sucks. Don't have resources to run 6 Windows VMs and 4 Linux VMs at the same time, so I deleted the new machine.

For now I'll just run the 15.04 box headless and forget about it. Maybe this weekend I'll try Claggy's suggestion and go forward.

Managers 7.2 and earlier use wxWidgets 2.8, 7.4 uses 3.0. Installing libwxgtk2.8-0 should get 7.2 working.

Or just use the later version from LocutusOfBorg's PPA, that should be fixed.

A couple of weeks ago it was suggested to me that I create a couple of Virtual Box machines to run BOINC.

If you don't mind me asking, why?

Remember when the Seti servers were down for a few days? It had to do with that. We are limited to downloading 100 WUs for each physical CPU and 100 WUs for each physical GPU. I have 2 machines that burn through 100 GPU WUs during the normal Tuesday outages and 1 of these machines burns through 100 CPU WUs in a day. The suggestion was to create a couple of Virtual boxes which would each be able to get 100 WUs. The faster machine now runs 4 virtual machines using 1 core each and it allocates the rest to the physical machine. The second fastest machine runs 2 virtual machines using 1 core each with the remaining cores allocated to the physical machine. Where I used to be limited to 200 CPU WUs I now get 800 CPU WUs. That Minimum work buffer max of 10 days only helps if you're running on older CPU architecture or if you don't give all of your resources to Seti. Now I've got something closer to a 5 day buffer for the CPUs. There are no performance advantages that I've noticed, RAC is pretty much the same.

I see. Well, as long as there's no performance loss, sure, why not.

The other alternative is go forward rather than backwards, add the locutusofborg-ppa:

https://launchpad.net/~costamagnagianfranco/+archive/ubuntu/locutusofborg-ppa

Claggy

Claggy, you da man! Over on the Ubuntu help forum the answer I got was pretty useless. What I got by following the very simple instructions at locutusofborg-ppa was what I was looking for, something that works! I should have followed your advice 2 days ago.