I could connect under the old classic system, but now whenever I open the Boinc Manager it says "Connection Failed" and on the bottom it says "Disconnected". I'm trying to connect to Seti@home, but I can't get past the most basic Boinc Manager screen.

If it matters, here's my computers basic internet info:

It's a laptop running Mac OS X 10.3.9
I am connected to the internet through AirPort wireless

That's basically all I can think to list.

Thanks!

Could you post a few lines of messages from the log covering a connection attempt?

Did you go through the attachment procedure, or is that where you're hitting the error? Your account shows no hosts attached at the moment. I also note that no Classic results are shown; were you unable to activate your original account under BOINC?

---

His problem is the thing where the Boinc Manager starts but the Boinc daemon does not. It's the classic "Cannot connect to localhost" problem. I've asked James to post it here on the Seti Q&P forums, as first he posted it on the BOINC forums. I would like to help him out, but don't know how to do this on a Mac. (Sorry, Windows geezer ;))

---

His problem is the thing where the Boinc Manager starts but the Boinc daemon does not. It's the classic "Cannot connect to localhost" problem. I've asked James to post it here on the Seti Q&P forums, as first he posted it on the BOINC forums. I would like to help him out, but don't know how to do this on a Mac. (Sorry, Windows geezer ;))

I'd be glad to help, but never having seen that problem I haven't a clue what to do about it ... and I'm using BOINC Menubar, so I have no idea how the Mac version of BOINC Manager behaves.

I assume he's tried rebooting, and repairing permissions; those are the most drastic, high-tech troubleshooting actions I've had to take on my systems ... ;)

What does the Activity Monitor show in the way of BOINC-related processes?

---

Okay here is a log from Boinc Menubar (not Boinc Manager). I've downloaded both - neither worked - but I'll be happy to use either one if the solution is known for one but not the other.

2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Starting BOINC client version 5.2.13 for powerpc-apple-darwin
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] libcurl/7.14.0 OpenSSL/0.9.7i zlib/1.1.4
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Data directory: /Library/Application Support/BOINC Data
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Processor: 1 Power Macintosh PowerBook5,4
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Memory: 512.00 MB physical, 0 bytes virtual
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Disk: 74.41 GB total, 9.56 GB free
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Can't open temp state file: client_state_next.xml
2006-04-11 16:13:59 [---] Couldn't modify the state file. Make sure you have permissions configured for BOINC to run on this system under this user account

Could it be a problem of potential hard disk space? I've got 9.56 GB available - which seems like plenty.

It also talks about permissions, but I've tried it on both this account and my admin account. Neither worked, but I guess they could be different problems. I'm really at a loss.

Also looking at it, the problem seems to be centered around this "temp state file: client_state_next.xml" - which is both obvious and means nothing to me.

Okay, so I trashed and reinstalled the oldest version of the Boinc Menubar (listed on the site).

It still doesn't connect, but now the problem isn't that temp_xml file - so maybe this problem will be easier to solve.

The error is an invalid or non-existent account key. I am using the account key listed on 'Your Account' on the website. I even tried setting up a new account with a different email address and that didn't work (though maybe for a different reason).

Here's the new display log error:

2006-04-11 17:36:33 [---] Starting BOINC client version 4.43 for powerpc-apple-darwin
2006-04-11 17:36:33 [---] Data directory: /Users/jamesedsel/Library/Application Support/BOINC Data
2006-04-11 17:36:33 [http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/] Computer ID: not assigned yet; location: ; project prefs: default
2006-04-11 17:36:33 [---] No general preferences found - using BOINC defaults
2006-04-11 17:36:33 [---] Insufficient work; requesting more
2006-04-11 17:36:35 [http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/] Requesting 8640.00 seconds of work
2006-04-11 17:36:35 [http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/] Sending scheduler request to http://setiboinc.ssl.berkeley.edu/sah_cgi/cgi
2006-04-11 17:36:36 [http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/] Scheduler request to http://setiboinc.ssl.berkeley.edu/sah_cgi/cgi succeeded
2006-04-11 17:36:36 [SETI@home] Message from server: Invalid or missing account key. Visit this project's web site to get an account key.
BOINC failed to log in to http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/.
Please check your account key and try again.
2006-04-11 17:36:36 [SETI@home] Resetting project
2006-04-11 17:36:36 [---] request_reschedule_cpus: exit_tasks
2006-04-11 17:36:36 [SETI@home] Detaching from project

The "key" under Your Account isn't the key to log in with. It's the Project cross-over ID.

You can get your key from the email that Berkeley sent you when you first tried to make an account. It'll be a 32 character hexadecimal key. If you want to get it again, use the account key retrieval.

make sure you can receive emails from Berkeley and that they don't disappear into your SPAM filter.

---

In doing so, I figured out what the problem was! The explanation and solution would take a minute or two and I'm going to play some online poker to relieve the stresses of tinkering with my computer for about two hours.

Please do post the details when you have leisure; it could be of help to others here, especially those who make the effort to search for solutions before posing their questions.

---

"In doing so, I figured out what the problem was! The explanation and solution would take a minute or two and I'm going to play some online poker to relieve the stresses of tinkering with my computer for about two hours."


"" Please do post the details when you have leisure; it could be of help to others here, especially those who make the effort to search for solutions before posing their questions.""

I'm not sure if that was an insult or not. Wasn't expecting that: it's definitely my first lambasting on a support forum. But rest assured I've been working on this since I've posted and finally figured it out this afternoon.

Moving on, in retrospect the solution isn't that complicated at all. It's just that I tried so many things I had to think about what was effective and what wasn't.

I'm not sure what problems were general and what were specific to my case, so I'll just talk case-specific.

According to the display log, seti@home wasn't opening that "client_state_next.xml" file, even though I knew I had the file cause I found it on my Library/Application Support folder. As far as I could tell, the program wasn't opening any of these files (but that was probably a moot point since it never got past that client_state file).

I can't remember where, but at one point a prompt said that I didn't have the proper priviledges to access the file.

Anyway, after tinkering with it for awhile, I did two things (again case-specific) that I think helped. First, I took away every Account restriction I could think of - like passwords, etc, that separated my Account from the Admin account.

That didn't really solve things, so what I did next was switched to the Admin account and - and this is what (in my opinion solved it) decrypted my Home folder.

As ya'll probably know, for Macs, in the System Prefs/Accounts setting - you can turn on/off a setting called File Vault. Basically, File Vault encrypts every program/document within it's keep (which I think includes most Apps and Folders). This took about 50 minutes.

But after that, I uninstalled every app/doc relating to BOINC. I then re-downloaded the oldest BOINC command GUI and used a new account (in order to really start from a completely clean slate). And everything worked. I then re-downloaded the latest BOINC Manager GUI and it also worked.

So in summation, the whole process could have been superfluous except for getting a new account, but since I did that twice in the week and a half I've been messing with this, I tend to think that it was not the sole problem.

My theory is that the "client_state" file (and all other support programs in that folder) were installed by default in my Admin account and not in my secondary account (it's happened before). And when I didn't have the ability to automatically access and boot those files because they were encrypted by FileVault, the whole thing stalled. When I unencrypted those files and tried on my Admin account, everything worked then. (As a note, I'd tried doing it all on my Admin account w/o unencrypting and that didn't work).

Now, I haven't tried to do the whole thing on my secondary account, but if that doesn't work, I'm almost certain that the solution is to simply give it the same access as my Admin account, since everything else is now working.

I hope all that makes some sense and helps for the future.

---

I don't run a mac, I'm a linux man myself, but I was just browsing these posts to kill time and I have a theory. Since the boinc client uses networking on the localhost interface, I was just curious that this may bypass any automatic decryption that would have to take place on an encrypted file system? As I said, just a theory on this, but I have in the past (a long time ago) ran a dos program called "stacker" that compresses a drive and uncompresses things on the fly when they're called, but some programs wouldn't run from a "stacked" drive because the program communicated with it's different parts without using system calls that would trigger the uncompression. That caused the program to fail unless it was removed and installed onto a "non-stacked" drive (or portion of the drive).

---

Jim

Some people plan their life out and look back at the wealth they've had.
Others live life day by day and look back at the wealth of experiences and enjoyment they've had.

Please do post the details when you have leisure; it could be of help to others here, especially those who make the effort to search for solutions before posing their questions.

I'm not sure if that was an insult or not. Wasn't expecting that: it's definitely my first lambasting on a support forum. But rest assured I've been working on this since I've posted and finally figured it out this afternoon.

It wasn't intended to be an insult—some bitchiness maybe, but certainly not directed at you.

... what I did next was switched to the Admin account and - and this is what (in my opinion solved it) decrypted my Home folder.

As ya'll probably know, for Macs, in the System Prefs/Accounts setting - you can turn on/off a setting called File Vault. ...

I was aware of the feature, but never used it. It only encrypts a user's Home folder, not most apps and other shared documents, but a single-user BOINC installation goes into that user's Library/Application Support/ folder, not the system-wide one.

Thanks for the explanation!

---

I do not know if you have configured Boinc according to the 'Commands" pull down menu.

Make sure that "suspend" in that pull down menu is not selected. Chose 'run always' or 'run based on preferences'.

---

Kenn

What is left unsaid is neither heard, nor heeded.
Ce qui est laissé inexprimé ni n'est entendu, ni est observé.