Distributed Computing "Advances"

Quirk writes "NewScientist is reporting on..."Software to be launched in January will let PC users run as many "distributed computing" projects as they like. The program will let PC users search for aliens, help predict climate change and perform advanced biological research - all at the same time."'It is called the Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC). BOINC acts like a software platform that can run a number of screen-saver style applications on top of the PC's own operating system.'"

Comments

pretty sweet

[lotas]

im already running boinc on a few of the machines at home and work and it works cool. i especially like the built in queing and multi processor support.

Re:pretty sweet

[lotas]

they have a beta test on their site (http://setiboinc.ssl.berkeley.edu/ap/). i just downloaded it, setup an account on the site and it works.

Good news for standards

[Palverone]

Even though you *can* do multiple projects at one time, you have to run seperate applications (if I'm correct) so this would be a good integration into one application that handles multiple projects and allows your machine to be used more efficiently.

Stuff to read again...

[BillGodfrey]

If you didn't read it first time, here it is again...

My Primer on building a distributed computing project.

(It still needs updating.)

seti@home wasnt the first distributed process

[Indy1]

typical reporters fscked their facts in the story.

qoute "The first and easily the best known is SETI@home, which since 1999 has enlisted half a million people to analyse data from the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico, looking for signs of alien life."

I believe distributed.net's client was the first program of its type to download information from a remote server, use idle cpu cycles to calculate whatever, then resubmit it back to the central server. I ran distributed.net back in 98, more then a year before seti came out.

Re:Who is Benefiting?

[Anonymous Coward]

From the Folding@home website FAQ:

"Who "owns" the results? What will happen to them?

Unlike other distributed computing projects, Folding@home is run by an academic institution (specifically the Pande Group, at Stanford University's Chemistry Department), which is a nonprofit institution dedicated to science research and education. We will not sell the data or make any money off of it.
Moreover, we will make the data available for others to use. In particular, the results from Folding@home will be made available on several levels. Most importantly, analysis of the simulations will be submitted to scientific journals for publication, and these journal articles will be posted on the web page after publication. Next, after publication of these scientific articles which analyze the data, the raw data of the folding runs will be available for everyone, including other researchers, here on this web site."

http://www.stanford.edu/group/pandegroup/folding /

Didn't see anyone else post this yet...

[xaoslaad]

http://boinc.berkeley.edu/

I didn't see it in the story either. Pardon me please if I'm just blind/illiterate

SETI@home source is available.

[SETIGuy]

A meta-app that exists to download yet more closed-source code without telling me... nope, that's over the line.

The SETI@home (under boinc) source code is available under the GPL. The AstroPulse code should be available shortly. Yes, now you can see how bad my code really is.

What you won't get with the code is our code signing key (which is under lock and key on an isolated machine) or the ability to distribe your version from our servers, but you are welcome to compile versions for use on your machines and/or distribute your own versions. We won't guarantee to anyone that your version doesn't erase harddrives or distribute child porn, though.

Re:What about licensing?

[SETIGuy]

BOINC was initially distributed under the Mozilla Public License. The reason for the (temporary) change to the BOINC public license is described here.