Yes, I forgot that the db keeps growing. But the deadline is not important if the process described below is slightly modified, to wit, as soon as there are three (or four or whatever) consistent results, close the wu. The decision on the wu has been made, de facto. Don't invoke a time limit. Then when there are system issues that delay the return of results no one gets harmed...

No one gets 'harmed' in any case. (This is a volunteer effort after all.)

The existing time limits are very reasonable to avoid the database of 'pending' WUs from growing exorbitantly large. It also reassures people about when they will get their pending credit granted.

The main thing for including time limits is to clear out WUs that have died due to whatever unforeseen circumstance. If there's enough of them flagged, then additional programming can be included for that occurrence. Meanwhile, the timeouts avoid the database and diskspace from getting choked.


As for the recent network problems crippling the Berkeley systems, hopefully that was a one-time event. The only people caught out were those with their WU caches set "To The Max"...

I'm attached to two projects with a cache of 0.1 days. This machine was never idle and no work was lost.

Boinc is different to the old s@h-classic.

Happy 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)

Yes, I forgot that the db keeps growing. But the deadline is not important if the process described below is slightly modified, to wit, as soon as there are three (or four or whatever) consistent results, close the wu. The decision on the wu has been made, de facto. Don't invoke a time limit. Then when there are system issues that delay the return of results no one gets harmed.

Of course, alot of people are getting credit for that fourth returned result, me included. But I think the credit is not due to us because the decision on the unit was already complete. So the 4th result is not adding to the 'science' except for adding a wee bit more confidence in the result.

Look it up. If it has three results that are already validated, abort it. Otherwise, keep crunching, you may be the third result, and prevent the need for someone else to do the crunching. If there are three results and they are not validating, then keep crunching as you may make a quorum with two of the others and get the science complete and not require another computer to do the crunching.

If it is going to be more than a couple of days late, abort it anyway as it is likely, but not guaranteed that the replacement will be back before yours is in.

So it really depends.

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May this Farce be with You

As Paul mentioned, the amount of data on the server(s) would increased dramatically with all the pending wu's. Not to mention all the threads and posts that would be generated by people who are tired of waiting for their credit. The deadline would increase if for whatever reason that particular wu generated alot of errors and needed to be resent or someone couldn't meet the deadline...

Is there any sentiment to extend the expiration date on seti?

I've asked the community before and there no one gave a concrete reason why three or four weeks wouldn't be just as good as two weeks. Since command central doesn't review the data for 6m at a time (at least until the 'real time analysis' is proven out) I don't see the harm. And it would help the people who are on the tail of the report-back time distributions from time to time.

If you set the deadline to 4 weeks, there are still people that will be late then. Set it to a year, same thing ...

Bottom line, the project decided that 2 weeks was long enough to do the work in a reasonable amount of time, they did not want the on-line database to grow too much and this is one of the ways elected to keep the queue pruned.

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Is there any sentiment to extend the expiration date on seti?

I've asked the community before and there no one gave a concrete reason why three or four weeks wouldn't be just as good as two weeks. Since command central doesn't review the data for 6m at a time (at least until the 'real time analysis' is proven out) I don't see the harm. And it would help the people who are on the tail of the report-back time distributions from time to time.

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May this Farce be with You

Lucky you! How did you manage to get a "few new computers"? I may need to talk to your supplier. Of course, I think I need a bigger house to put more computers in. LOL

I just got a few new computers too, so I'll have some more crunching going on.

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Since I decided to add more projects, I am just going through and processing all the WUs I have on my computers and not allowing any more work. And then once I get down to only having the climate prediction left, I am going to allow new work. I had to adjust the connect every X days because that is what was causing the problem, just downloading too much. I just got a few new computers too, so I'll have some more crunching going on.

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- cJ

Look it up. If it has three results that are already validated, abort it. Otherwise, keep crunching, you may be the third result, and prevent the need for someone else to do the crunching. If there are three results and they are not validating, then keep crunching as you may make a quorum with two of the others and get the science complete and not require another computer to do the crunching.

If it is going to be more than a couple of days late, abort it anyway as it is likely, but not guaranteed that the replacement will be back before yours is in.

So it really depends.

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BOINC WIKI

It'll report after the deadline, but if the other users have already reported and been validated, you won't get credit for it. In that case, the science is done by others, you may as well abort it and start anew.

MJ

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I have a WU that isnt going to be done by its deadline.. It is running full time right now, but it just wont be done in time. Is there any reason for me to keep processing it or should I just abort it? Will it report after the deadline or is it just a waste for me to keep processing.

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- cJ