What's your thoughts on the recent withdrawal of PDB and your continuing participation?

Rather than to turn Pauls' thread into a conspiracy or complaint thread I figured I'd start one that everyone would be free to express themselves in.

I too feel like users are ignored by management of many projects. They all want our puters, but not us.

I stopped running Seti beta when I felt that way (though I have returned in the last month).

Predictor has ticked me off the way they treated Paul and don't talk to users.

I recently joined Ralph, I got enthusiastic about rosetta after that (12 days ago), although I silently crunched WUs from early in the project. When I started asking questions and making observations that users/projects could use to narrow down the search for bugs, I got the feeling from Project Mods and scientists, that too many questions were bad. Talking on some subjects weren't wanted by the project, so they had no place on the boards. I even had a post moderated out. What was in the offensive post??? two words "thank you". This is a good example of dictatorial control of what can be spoke of.

FAH is even worse. If you're not a cheerleader or seem like someone who can be lead by the nose, you're posts are moderated there. Don't even think of mentioning Boinc on those boards. I like to think I follow the rules and tried to do so their. I tried to make boinc better understood to their users by explaining how it worked. At first it was encouraged, then suddenly, I got moderated for being to "in depth". How do I decide what fits their wants? What level?? I stopped participating there and won't be doing any FAH if and when it comes out.

I have made my decisions on what to do. I am doing it. I don't think a "hey, let's gang up on Project X" conspiracy is warranted. I do think an open exchange of experiences so that others can better make their decisions is a good thing.

What are your thoughts/experiences?

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Just get on and Crunch, if people don't like something that is going on then leave its no biggie.

I used to get annoyed with some BOINC projects but I don't anymore I have better things to do then cry over a project.

That my point of view anyway

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Well the lack of feedback from other projects is one of threas I haven't spread beyond seti.

Most the other project don't give a clear incation of what they going to be used for.

sure there are Cure X projects, but Cure X for who? and who is going to have access to the project results?

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AMD Athlon 64 3000+ w/Windows
AMD Athlon 1800+ w/Linux

I will let my computer crunch for any (not for private profit) BOINC project, until they treat me or people I respect with disdain.

A few projects have lost my small contribution recently.

Just get on and Crunch, if people don't like something that is going on then leave its no biggie.

That's 100% my point of view too.

If you do not like how things are going on the project then leave it.

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Join BOINC United now!

What's your thoughts on the recent withdrawal of PDB and your continuing participation?

...What are your thoughts/experiences?

What's PDB?

Torrey Lauer
Modern Travel Services / Rainbow Sky Travel
moderntravel d.0.1t net / RainbowSkyTravel d.0.1t com

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What's PDB?

Torrey Lauer

Paul D Buck

I used to crunch for every project that I could get my hands on, now I just crunch for those that I consider do important work (important to me, that is).

There is inevitably a power imbalance between the project developers and the volunteers. I as a volunteer only have to switch on the computer, pay the bills and choose a project to install and run, I don't have to do anything else (I may choose to, but I don't have to).

The developers on the other hand have to set up a project, try to make it work, code it & recode it, maintain it, try to fix the numerous problems that arise in any complex technical arena, and improve it as science and technical expertise and experience advances; essentially they have to run the whole thing. They have their own set of choices to make (which includes keeping the volunteers happy).

The developers have the rather more difficult set of decisions to make, I certainly don't envy them - and they will never please everybody, human nature will see to that.

So I'm going to continue to crunch because I support the idea of Distributed/Grid Computing and there are a few (not-for-profit only) projects out there whose science I'd like to see add to the sum of human knowledge.

It is always sad to see people leave (particularly ones that I respected) but I'm not going to second guess someone else's decisions. I have left Grid Computing myself, only to return (a year later) when my anger had subsided and my feelings had changed. For now I'm going to carry on crunching - the development of a whole new technology (and my small part in it) is worth it in my opinion.

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Join TeamACC

Sometimes I think we are alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we are not. In either case the idea is quite staggering.

The developers have the rather more difficult set of decisions to make, I certainly don't envy them - and they will never please everybody, human nature will see to that.

I agree. Just look at the this thread on Predictor to see something totally trivial and unimportant that some are complaining about now.
The project name in the BOINC manager

As far as communications go, how much is too much and how much is too little? I've seen some posts over the years through various projects complaining about a project's lack of communications for a problem while another post in the same forum complains about why they spending their time in the forum and not fixing the problem. A damned if they do and damned if they don't scenario...

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To truly explore, one must keep an open mind...

I know Paul only through his posts on these forums. To me he seems to be extremely intelligent and ready willing and able to contribute to any project he chooses. He has shown that when he took on by himself the creation of the Boinc Wiki and only after it's initial creation did he ask for help editing the files.

Many of us have expressed frustration at the seemingly lack of communications from the project designers down to those of us who crunch for them. I was surprised to find out that it is worse at the other projects. Paul is expressing his frustration, by shutting down his systems, as is his right. Unfortunately he now joins the ranks of all the others who complained "fix this or I'm leaving" or "fix my classic credits or I'm leaving". I sincerely wish he had NOT chosen this way to demonstrate his frustration because he certainly does not belong in that group.

On the other hand if you look at his computers they have been winding down for a couple of months. If it was a spur of the moment decision he has had lot's of time to change his mind before his announcement today. But this is typical for Paul. I never saw him post in a thread without first considering carefully his choice of words.

I for one will not forget PDB!

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Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....

I know Paul only through his posts on these forums. To me he seems to be extremely intelligent and ready willing and able to contribute to any project he chooses. He has shown that when he took on by himself the creation of the Boinc Wiki and only after it's initial creation did he ask for help editing the files.

Many of us have expressed frustration at the seemingly lack of communications from the project designers down to those of us who crunch for them. I was surprised to find out that it is worse at the other projects. Paul is expressing his frustration, by shutting down his systems, as is his right. Unfortunately he now joins the ranks of all the others who complained "fix this or I'm leaving" or "fix my classic credits or I'm leaving". I sincerely wish he had NOT chosen this way to demonstrate his frustration because he certainly does not belong in that group.

On the other hand if you look at his computers they have been winding down for a couple of months. If it was a spur of the moment decision he has had lot's of time to change his mind before his announcement today. But this is typical for Paul. I never saw him post in a thread without first considering carefully his choice of words.

I for one will not forget PDB!

DITTO
He gave above and beyond the call!

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I Desire Peace and Justice, Jim Scott (Mod-Ret.)

What are your thoughts/experiences?

Paul will truly be missed.

But I think that some of us have unreasonably high expectations.

For example, I don't expect much feedback from a project, aside from the type of statistics and news that we see on the SETI site. I think that Matt Lebofsky's participation in the forums is above and beyond.

I think we're frequently asking for information (like "when will we be switching to Enhanced?") when the project does not know the answer.

On another thread, someone pointed out that the project does not work for the crunchers -- it is the other way around. We are "selling" our resources, and they are the buyers. When I'm selling, I dress up nicely, put on a big smile, and talk nice to the buyer. When I'm buying, dude, it's shorts and T-Shirts.

I've seen some good suggestions, and I've seen some that would be incredibly difficult to do. BOINC has something like two people on staff writing code, and some incredibly creative volunteers. It's functionality first, and cool stuff later, unless someone wants to volunteer their coding skills.

An essential feature of any BOINC project is that they can be run on a shoestring -- on virtually no money at all. That means hand-me-down equipment and very little staff. It means single connections to the net (and software designed for fault-tolerance).

So, yeah, I'm definitely in the "sit back and crunch" category -- enjoy the ride. I'm not going to "create" clock cycles just for SETI, but they're welcome to any and all "waste" clocks. I'm also part of the BOINC Alpha project, and they get some of my time reporting on new client versions (on old operating systems).

... and when I start taking things too seriously, I'll disappear for a little while, work on other projects and check back later.

-- Ned

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I used to crunch for every project that I could get my hands on, now I just crunch for those that I consider do important work (important to me, that is).

There is inevitably a power imbalance between the project developers and the volunteers. I as a volunteer only have to switch on the computer, pay the bills and choose a project to install and run, I don't have to do anything else (I may choose to, but I don't have to).

The developers on the other hand have to set up a project, try to make it work, code it & recode it, maintain it, try to fix the numerous problems that arise in any complex technical arena, and improve it as science and technical expertise and experience advances; essentially they have to run the whole thing. They have their own set of choices to make (which includes keeping the volunteers happy).

The developers have the rather more difficult set of decisions to make, I certainly don't envy them - and they will never please everybody, human nature will see to that.

So I'm going to continue to crunch because I support the idea of Distributed/Grid Computing and there are a few (not-for-profit only) projects out there whose science I'd like to see add to the sum of human knowledge.

It is always sad to see people leave (particularly ones that I respected) but I'm not going to second guess someone else's decisions. I have left Grid Computing myself, only to return (a year later) when my anger had subsided and my feelings had changed. For now I'm going to carry on crunching - the development of a whole new technology (and my small part in it) is worth it in my opinion.

This pretty much sums up my opinion better than I could have put it myself.

One thing I would like to add is it usually takes me a minimum of 2 hours a day to read and reply to my BOINC emails and the forums. I do not want the project administrators to spend this much time on the forums, I would much rather they be using this time for other aspects of the project.

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BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8

Ned said -

An essential feature of any BOINC project is that they can be run on a shoestring -- on virtually no money at all. That means hand-me-down equipment and very little staff. It means single connections to the net (and software designed for fault-tolerance).
-- Ned

This is one of the problems with BOINC projects - they are led to believe by BOINC that they can run on a shoestring budget, when what they really need to be successful is the background crew doing the coding and project management, and a front person to maintain communication with the user base on what is happening. That person's JOB should be sitting on these forums day after day, keeping track of issues, communicating with the back room folks, and updating the issues on the forum.

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Ned said -

An essential feature of any BOINC project is that they can be run on a shoestring -- on virtually no money at all. That means hand-me-down equipment and very little staff. It means single connections to the net (and software designed for fault-tolerance).
-- Ned

This is one of the problems with BOINC projects - they are led to believe by BOINC that they can run on a shoestring budget, when what they really need to be successful is the background crew doing the coding and project management, and a front person to maintain communication with the user base on what is happening. That person's JOB should be sitting on these forums day after day, keeping track of issues, communicating with the back room folks, and updating the issues on the forum.

You are missing something here that many people seem to miss - All of these projects are successful without the constant communication. Yes people complain, and some leave, but enough still crunch. As long as each project gets enough users to do their work, then they will not, and in my opinion should not, spend more time on the forums. They will spend their time on the science, which is the purpose of the whole thing in the first place.

It is only during testing phases and if they need more users that they can justify spending the time on the forums or updating users through the websites.

Remember, the success of the project is based on the project leader's expectations, not the cruncher's expectations.

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What's your thoughts on the recent withdrawal of PDB and your continuing participation?

Mostly just sadness....but tinged with a bit of "wonder"...as in I wonder if anyone will "wake up". Or will it be just another disgruntled user left -- no big deal, just press on. But, Paul was NOT "just another user". He is (was) an important part of a community. He earned a lot of respect for his efforts. If you actively drive away all of the leaders in a community, the community will drift apart. Perhaps another person will step up and fill the void left...perhaps not....

Predictor has ticked me off the way they treated Paul and don't talk to users.

Yea, they ticked me off a while ago too. I was personally really upset by this one, because I actually happen to "know" the PI (Principle Investigator) of record on that one....had lunch with him at a scientific meeting that we both attended. I doubt that he would remember me.

I honestly think that a lot of the issues at Predictor could be "explained" by looking at the little line on their home page labeled "Job Opportunities". It looks like they are looking for a Postdoc to manage the predictor/BOINC project. Have been for a while now...thought about applying for it myself, but the commute to CA (from the midwest) would have been horrible!

I recently joined Ralph, I got enthusiastic about rosetta after that (12 days ago), although I silently crunched WUs from early in the project. When I started asking questions and making observations that users/projects could use to narrow down the search for bugs, I got the feeling from Project Mods and scientists, that too many questions were bad....

I found rosetta just about the same time that I got fed up with Predictor. I have posted a couple of things over there. I, too, am getting fed up with the attitude of the mods. I have been impressed that they are attempting to use the volunteers to help solve problems -- the recent change to specify the run time for a workunit as a preference came out of a discussion over there. The "1% bug" thread is an active attempt to solve a longstanding issue by involving users.

I have made my decisions on what to do. I am doing it. I don't think a "hey, let's gang up on Project X" conspiracy is warranted. I do think an open exchange of experiences so that others can better make their decisions is a good thing.

I agree, and that is part of why this traditional lurker is actually posting something here.

Paul had enumerated some Rights and Responsibilities in a thread in the Cafe. I like the idea, but the words are, perhaps, a bit too formal for my personal tastes. Without trying to trivialize it, "with rights come responsibilities", or "Treat others the way you would like to be treated".

There are (at least) two sides to any issue. I used to be on a team that ran a large internal-only website. We got some stupid number of hits per day, from users on 6 continents. I don't remember the numbers anymore, and had to leave the data behind when the company got aquired, but we had seven server-class machines to host that website. A lot of what we are complaining about here were the same things that I heard when I was doing that job. "You don't tell us what's going on". Well, sometimes, by the time I learned what was going on, it was already fixed. Sometimes, I was too busy fixing the problem -- do you want me to spend 45 minutes telling you about it, or fixing it? Once it was fixed, would there be more calls and questions if I did put something up there?

We had a lot of issues with "stale content". After a while, you just can't think of anything else to put in that "message of the day" box. Some things seem too trivial or trite. Others are too complex to explain in any meaningful way in the available space, and you find yourself writing for 3 hours to find the right words, which then earns you a "slap" from managment for "wasting so much time". Other times we would get too optimistic about announcing things, and people would get upset because we didn't meet a proposed deadline. I think I have heard Matt echo those frustrations here a couple of times....

Probably the most frustrating thing was the conflicting user requests. We want bigger letters, more information on the top half of the first page, and you can't collapse, hide or move information to a secondary page. If anyone can figure out how to put MORE stuff on a single web page without using a smaller font or cleverly overlapping or hiding information, or letting the page scroll, I really want to talk to them. There were lots of requests about being "more user friendly", but no one could ever explain to me what they meant by that...usually it got simplified to "figure out what I will be needing today and put it on the top of that initial page in big letters". There are also apparently a lot of people out there that can't use scroll bars, and don't understand that the whole world doesn't use THEIR computer (with its choice of browser, resolution and other installed software) to view a web page.

So, the point of that long rant was that it can be difficult to sit on the "other side" too. As an end user of a large system, we should treat the developers, scientists and moderators with the same degree of respect that we would like to receive. Ranting, raving, profanity, and other childish behavior generally won't help get your point across.

At the same time, those same moderators, scientists and developers should take some time to treat the users with respect too. If lots of people are posting about the same issues over and over, then, it is really something that needs to be addressed! Personally, I have noticed several themes that have popped up over and over here. Credit causes a lot of angst. I see this as an indication that the current credit system is flawed and needs to be dealt with. The stability of servers is a standing SETI issue. (yea, beta, I know, for both)

You have a huge pool of very talented people here that are willing to help. What is stopping you from asking them for the help you need? Don't piss off the volunteers. It makes them angry and less likely to help you out of your next crisis....

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What's your thoughts on the recent withdrawal of PDB and your continuing participation?
....
What are your thoughts/experiences?

I'm a member of the BOINC community for 1 and a half years now. First I crunched for SETI (BOINC) only. Then, when more and more projects were available, I gave all of them a reasonable amount of CPU cycles (see my signature). I stopped crunching for the most of them, because they don't care about their most valuable resource: the PARTICIPANT. They use excuses like "WE HAVE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS TO DO NOW" or "OUR TOP PRIORITY IS BLA BLA". Guess what? Without the participant donating his computer power voluntarily, NO project would run. So is there anything what could be MORE IMPORTANT than the participant?
The worst project in my opinion is Predictor (didn't update their technical and science status in 9 months).

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... The worst project in my opinion is Predictor (didn't update their technical and science status in 9 months).

Well, for the ones I've looked at, the accolade of the best web site and layout has to go to BBC Climate Change Experiment. And best most informative site: Climate Prediction dot Net (site layout a little awkward!).

The Climate Prediction project people seem to be very keen and helpful and are often to be seen in the forums with their carefull appropriate comments that keep that project feeling very "live".

But then again to consider here on s@h, I can't see how we can get any more info out of Matt L than we do already!!! Check out his postings and tech news. Any more and I'll be on the bandwaggon to tell him to get hacking and to leave wasting time with the forums fights for the cheerleaders champions!

My view is that if a project is running smoothly, then just the occasional status updates is all that is needed. How often is the front page of GIMPS updated for example?...

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)

What's your thoughts on the recent withdrawal of PDB and your continuing participation?
[...]
What are your thoughts/experiences?

Paul was/is a pioneer and his effort and work on the BOINC Wiki is greatly appreciated. Whatever his reasons for withdrawal, a maintainer, more than a pioneer, is what the Wiki needs at this stage.

Many people are building their lives around the BOINC credit system.
Others around chit-chat in the forums. And when the forums don't support the coziness, jokes, and small talk, they feel that they're not welcome, and that the project and its maintainers are not worth supporting.

If some maintainers feel that cutting out the chit-chatty experience will be an asset that boosts progress of their projects, they will be disappointed. As much as some maintainers would like BOINC projects to be only about computers and the pure heart of science, they will have to deal with real people.

People, more than anything else, make BOINC projects succeed.

Especially people like Paul D Buck.

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"Are you suggesting coconuts migrate?"

Ned said -

An essential feature of any BOINC project is that they can be run on a shoestring -- on virtually no money at all. That means hand-me-down equipment and very little staff. It means single connections to the net (and software designed for fault-tolerance).
-- Ned

This is one of the problems with BOINC projects - they are led to believe by BOINC that they can run on a shoestring budget, when what they really need to be successful is the background crew doing the coding and project management, and a front person to maintain communication with the user base on what is happening. That person's JOB should be sitting on these forums day after day, keeping track of issues, communicating with the back room folks, and updating the issues on the forum.

... and I submit that with 818,000 active hosts (according to BOINC Stats) that SETI is successful beyond their wildest dreams. We're about to get a new science application because they can crank up the sensitivity (do more intense calculations) and still have more computing power than they really need.

Of the 397,000 users, I wonder how many have even visited these forums? Have more than 1% even posted?

The "front person" you are describing is basically doing Public Relations, and to what end? To keep the 1% here happy while the other 99% basically ignore the project and crunch?

At $35,000/year, plus benefits, office space, etc.... That'd buy three new, fully loaded Sun V40z servers each year.

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