I received an email from a Berkeley researcher, asking for donations to SETI. I had run SETI at home years ago and I thought I'd give it another go. I downloaded the BOINC, installed, and opened. Got a message that BOINC could not connect to the core server. In looking at the threads on this site, I am truly amazed that things cannot be a little simpler for something that is created by a major university, used by many educators/researchers, and available for some time. I have made a donation to SETI@ home and I will be uninstalling the crappy BOINC software. I'm very disappointed.

It is possible you were trying to connect during the weekly black out on Tuesdays or that you experienced some of the severe system slow down while the staff was out of the area (we think they were at least) due to air quality issues from the California Wildfires.

If this was really complicated to setup on the average main stream Windows computer I wouldn't be here.

I would have lost patience like you have.

I respectfully request you take a second look.

Please.

Tom
ps Even my Linux setups have to be very turn-key because I don't understand Linux at all.

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A proud member of the OFA (Old Farts Association).

Well Tom Regnier, I'm sorry to read that you are upset with the way BOINC worked for you.
However it does appear that your computer did connect to the server as it got some work on November 18:

7155559464 	3222771113 	18 Nov 2018, 13:28:48 UTC 	1 Jan 2019, 7:35:47 UTC 	In progress 	--- 	--- 	--- 	SETI@home v8 v8.22 (opencl_ati_cat132)
windows_intelx86
7155559465 	3222771119 	18 Nov 2018, 13:28:48 UTC 	10 Jan 2019, 18:28:30 UTC 	In progress 	--- 	--- 	--- 	SETI@home v8 v8.22 (opencl_ati_cat132)
windows_intelx86
7155559232 	3222771015 	18 Nov 2018, 13:28:48 UTC 	1 Jan 2019, 7:35:47 UTC 	In progress 	--- 	--- 	--- 	SETI@home v8 v8.08 (alt)
windows_x86_64

Looking at the dates when you installed BOINC and connected this computer to SETI, when the tasks were sent, and when you made your post I see that this all took place last Saturday - nowhere near the Tuesday blackout, so we can rule that out as being the cause of your woes. Generally BOINC is very straightforward - install, join a project, let it run.

There are those who delight in making life as hard as possible for themselves and others, and they tend to be the ones that post in these threads

So, a quick question, which should be very simple to answer
As you obviously managed to get BOINC running and connect to the project when did BOINC give you the "can't connect to the core server" message? (Was it a few hours after installing BOINC, or directly after?)

---

Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Bob,
I think when he said "core server" he wasn't talking about connecting with the Seti servers but a common error message I get when I logon to a 2nd userid under Windows while the Bonic Manager is running tasks under another Windows logon.

The 2nd logon, when Boinc Manager auto starts usually produces an error that says something like "unable to connect to boinc clients". I have inferred that means another copy of the Boinc Manger is already talking to the client tasks.

I am waiting for the results of a PM exchange with him with baited breath :)

Tom

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A proud member of the OFA (Old Farts Association).

The error showed up immediately. In fact, I have not seen anything other than the error message. I tried to connect to projects or do anything, but BOINC would do nothing other than give me the error message. As to Tom M's comment about waiting with baited breath, I have found that those with baited breath have usually had sushi for lunch. :-)

The error showed up immediately. In fact, I have not seen anything other than the error message. I tried to connect to projects or do anything, but BOINC would do nothing other than give me the error message. As to Tom M's comment about waiting with baited breath, I have found that those with baited breath have usually had sushi for lunch. :-)

A fishy answer that I certainly deserved! :)

Let me make sure I am understanding you.
1) You only have one userid on your windows machine? And you use it for everything? Yes/No?

2) Has your Windows fire wall complained about giving access to anything? Especially 127.0.0.1?

3) Could you go into your Window firewall and "allow" the local ip address 127.0.0.1?
Normally we don't have to do this, but I can imagine it producing the symptoms I think you are dealing with.

4) Have you located the "Event Log"? Can you copy maybe the first 30-40 lines right after you start up Boinc Manager and post them here? We have people (not me usually) who can read the log and spot issues that go right over my head. There are additional diagnostic flags we can ask you to turn on and then restart the Boinc Manager.

I will search for other ideas. I will be subscribing to this thread so I can see any responses from you more quickly.

Tom

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A proud member of the OFA (Old Farts Association).

Right, so its the connection between the BOINC manager (the bit we see on the desktop) and BOINC itself that is not working properly - there area few simple tests to see where the problem lies.
First, when trying to run BOINC & SETI open Windows Task Manager in "tasks" view, set it to see "tasks from all users" - do you see BOINC as a task?

If so, do you see a number of tasks with names like "MB8_x86............."?
How much "CPU" is the task using, if it is a about 100% then expand to see sub-tasks - BOINC itself only uses a very small amount of CPU effort, while the applications use a lot).

Is so, are they running against your user name, or another one?
If not your user name then we have a clue as to where the problem lies - Did you install BOINC "as a service"? This creates a "virtual user" and this can cause problems similar to the one you are describing. The one solution I know is to re-install BOINC, but this time in "normal" mode - there may be other solutions.

Tom's suggestion about looking at the event log only really works if BOINC manager has been able to connect to the copy of BOINC running, otherwise you have to find the file "client_state.xml", which is to be found in c:\ProgramData\BOINC\ But I would strongly advise you not to look at the file as it is an xml file with a lot more information than we are looking for in a very unreadable format :-(

By default most firewalls should allow intra-computer connections to 127.0.0.1 as that is how most stuff gets shuffled around within many programs - it is defined as an "internal, non-rotuable" address. BUT do make sure BOINC can communicate with the outside world.

Another thing to consider - has your AV software decided to block BOINC - this is not unknown and does cause all sorts of problems. To make sure, make BOINC an "exclude from scan" program, and exclude the folder c:\ProgramData\BOINC\ from being scanned.

---

Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Thanks, guys, for helping, but I'm not going to pursue it any further...too many other things to take care of in my life. I appreciate you stepping up. Have a good weekend...and find those ET's!