7.0.15 change log

- client: first pass at async file copy feature. When a large file is copied from a project dir to a slot dir, it's copied in chunks, interleaved with other polling activities such as GUI RPCs. That way the manager doesn't freeze while large copies (e.g. VM images) are happening

- client: add async file copy stuff to Windows project file.

- client: debug async file copy. Seems to be working.

- client: add async file copy stuff to Xcode project.

- SCR: Fix Xcode editor problems from recent screensaver.cpp changes.

- client: intermediate checkin for async file verification

- client: Fix compiler warning generated by above checkin.

- client: Undo my change of 24 Jan 2012 which broke WCG's use of the .gzb file extension. I was wrong in how I read the conditional and it turns out that libcurl does not attempt to honor the content-encoding if it was disabled as part of the request. My bad.

- client: tweaks to AMD GPU detection msgs

- client: async file stuff. sync decompress/verify seems to be working

- client: remove "GPU n is OpenCL-capable" messages. They were redundant with new OPENCL_DEVICE_PROP::description() and were confusing because they only listed the "best" CUDA / CAL GPUs.

- client: HTTP range request errors are permanent.

- Client: set threshold at 10 MB for doing things asynchronously. Don't count VERIFY_PENDING as failure

- client: Fix bug in setting opencl_device_index.

- client/Manager/GUI RPC: clean up RPC stuff involving resource-specific backoff and exclusion
Old: client writes <rsc_backoff_time><rsc_backoff_interval><no_rsc_ams><no_rsc_apps><no_rsc_pref>in GUI RPC entries for projects. Manager (GUI RPC client): PROJECT struct has cpu_backoff_time cpu_backoff_interval... cuda, ati no_cpu_pref... cuda, ati and it parses tags of these names. In other words, no information is being conveyed from client to Manager.
New: manager parses both forms

- client: fix bug in async file verify. File verify is done in 4 places: after a download finishes transition result to DOWNLOADED

if project->verify_files_on_app_start, on app start Use asynchrony only in the first 2 cases, since the async logic is set up to mark the file as PRESENT when done, not to restart a task

- VBOX: Remove the renaming of the vm disk image code. It isn't needed and it complicates things in the CC.

- client: bug fix for async file ops: set up files in slot dir when starting an app, whether or not it's the first time

- client: on startup, check file size as well as existence

- client: add <async_file_debug> log flag

- client: do decompress (both sync and async) to a temp file, then rename

- client: if a file's status is VERIFY_PENDING on startup, set it to NOT_PRESENT; that will trigger a verify

- client: do async copy only if size is above threshold

- client: fixed a bug in procinfo_app() that would cause processes to be treated as non-BOINC when they actually are, thus falsely triggering CPU-busy suspensions

- client: only check file size if the FILE_INFO specifies it.

- scheduler: don't send "update GPU driver" messages if the client didn't report a driver version #

7.0.16 change log

- client (Unix): don't print misleading "task exited with no finish file" message if task actually called boinc_temporary_exit().

- storage stuff

- client: If OpenCL but no CAL or no CUDA, copy GPU model name from OpenCL so it will apppear in the host table's serialnum attributes (requested by Oliver Bock.)

- MGR: Fix a bug which pushed modal dialogs (Attach Wizard) to rear when Manager process was brought to front from behind (Mac only.) This bug was probably introduced in Z-order tweak of 23 Jan 2012.

- client: zero PROJECT::last_upload_start on reset, so that we can fetch work immediately

- client: in PERS_FILE_XFER::create_xfer(), check for already-existing file before seeing we're allowed to start a new xfer

- client: in PERS_FILE_XFER::create_xfer(), if an async verify is in progress, mark PERS_FILE_XFER as done.

- client: message tweak

- MGR: Fix bad <organization_help_url> in Progress Through Processor's skin files provided by Matt Blumberg on 9 December 2011.

- client: Try to fix incorrect NVIDIA device number in OpenCL descriptions.

- MGR: Update <organization_*> tags in 3 branded skins (GR, PtP, CE) to new values from Matt Blumberg.

- Mac sandbox: In initial permissions check when launching Manager or Client, don't check project-created subdirectories under project or slot directories because we have not told projects these must be readable and executable by group.

- API: Remove apparently unnecessary include of carbon.h (requested by Bernd Machenschalk.)

- client: instead of saying "comm deferred", say "project backoff XXX.XX".

- client: more tweaks to work-fetch messages

- lib: change get_mac_address() to avoid sprintf(buf, "%s...", buf); use strcat instead

- client: don't use get_mac_address() to create host CPIDs (we have plenty of other info to make them unique)

- client: fetch work from backup (zero resource share) projects only if a device instance is idle

- client: Remove some temporary debugging code. small code shuffle

- client: Always use GPU model name from OpenCL if available for ATI / AMD GPUs because (we believe) it is more reliable and user-friendly.

- client: fix bug where WCG downloads were getting wrong size errors. To be honest, I don't know that the problem was or why my change fixed it.

- client: Prevent an unlikely but possible crash.

- MGR: Fix a Mac-only bug which showed Event Log if About BOINC is selected from task bar menu when BOINC is hidden.

7.0.17 change log

- Mac: Fix back trace to work under OS > 10.5.(Checked in to boinc_core_release_7_0_16 tag)

- client: Fix OpenCL NVIDIA GPU detection when CUDA is not present.

- client: tweak to work-fetch policy: if we're making a scheduler RPC to a project for reasons other than work fetch, and we're deciding whether to ask for work, ignore hysteresis; i.e. ask for work even if we're above the min buffer (idea from John McLeod).

- client: fix bug in notices where, after a notice is deleted, the notices tab refreshes once/second forever after

7.0.18 change log

- client: message tweaks

- Manager/Client: fix bugs in GUI RPC that prevented updates to proxy info from being saved by client

- Manager: compile fix

- client: define a "arrived-first" order on results in which the tiebreaker is MD5 of name. That way the order is stable (it doesn't change from one run of the client to the next) and it doesn't grep results with similar names (and hence for the same app). This ordering is used for 1) the order of display in the manager 2) the job scheduler's notion of FIFO

- client: Fix OpenCL NVIDIA GPU enumeration bug I introduced with last checkin.

7.0.19 change log

- Mac installer: Update copyright notice from 2009 to 2012.

- storage stuff

- Vbox: Include date component in log messages to ease debugging long running VM tasks.

- client: change the job scheduling policy for MT jobs. The old policy avoided running an N-CPU job unless N CPUs were free. This could result in idle CPUs for long periods; for example: on a 4-CPU machine, suppose you have a long 1-CPU job in EDF mode, and some 4-CPU jobs. 3 CPUs will be idle until the 1-CPU job finishes. Furthermore, the work fetch mechanism won't try to get jobs (possibly non-MT) from other projects, because the RR simulation doesn't reflect the scheduling policy's exclusion principle. The change: schedule jobs until ncpus_used >= ncpus. E.g. in the above situation run the 1- and 4-CPU jobs together. In extreme cases we might run 3 1-CPU jobs and the 4-CPU job. This will degrade the performance of the 4-CPU job, but that's probably better than having idle CPUs.

- API, client, and Manager: add an optional "reason" argument to boinc_temporary_exit(), explaining why the app is exiting. Convey this to the client, and then to the Manager, and display it there and in the log.

- client: fix an instance of sprintf(buf, "%s...", buf) on Unix

- API: fix compile error on Mac.

- client: When available, use total RAM value from CAL for all ATI OpenCL GPUs, not only for the "best" GPU, so the descriptions show this value.

- MGR: Update <organization_help_url> in Progress Through Processor's skin file again as requested by Matt Blumberg on 17 February 2012.

- Mac installer: Create RealName field for users boinc_master and boinc_project and set it to empty string (following new advice from Apple Developer technical Suport.)

- MGR: Rename the "Remaining" column to "Remaining (Estimated)" in the Advanced GUI/Work view.

- client: amend checkin of 18 Feb to not request work if work buffer is above upper limit

- client, web: change default prefs to min_buf=.1 days, max_buf=.5 days

- MGR: Change strings in Simple View to match changes in Advanced View: "Remaining" -> "Remaining (Estimated)", "Home page" instead of project name in web links.

- client: On Mac only, get ATI RAM sizes from OpenGL.

- VBOX: Implement an exponential backoff scheme of sleeping between commands if a session lock error has been detected. Cap the overall delay to 30 seconds total for a single command. Experiments performed by jujube(T4T) suggest changing the sleep interval to an exponential style backoff would increase our chances of recovering in situations where the previous lock is held by a previous instance of vboxmanage whos instance data hasn't been cleaned up within vboxsvc yet.

- client: fix crashing bug when there is 1 instance of a resources. I'm not sure how this every worked.

7.0.20 change log

- Mac installer: Utility shell script creates users & groups boinc_master and boinc_project with IDs at 501 or above; also creates RealName field for users boinc_master and boinc_project and sets it to empty string (following advice from Apple Developer technical Suport.)

- Manager: small code cleanup

- Manager: in Project Properties page, show if a GPU type is excluded by configuration

- client: don't fetch work for a resource type if all instances of that type are excluded

7.0.21 change log

- API: fix various bugs related to process control and critical sections.

- VBOX: Parse the vboxmanage error code for *nix as well.

- VBOX: Switch to using status.suspend_request instead of status.suspend when determining when to suspend/resume a VM. status.suspended is now only changed when direct_process_action is set to true.

- API: remove BOINC_STATUS::suspend_request; it's an implementation thing, not intended for export. Fix a related bug.

- VBOX: Setting the CPU Execution Cap should be done with the controlvm command after the VM has entered a running state instead of using modifyvm.

- VBOX: Allow the CPU execution cap to be set back to 100% after it had alreadly been set lower.

- VBOX: Only attempt to reset throttle values if the VM is in a running state, otherwise controlvm throws an error.

- VBOX: If a VM fails to start because the machine is low on memory, temporarily exit so BOINC can reschedule it for a later time. If the problem doesn't go away it'll just time out eventually anyway.

- client: msg tweak and fix compile warnings

- client: fix compile errors.

- client: In COPROCS::get_ati_mem_size_from_opengl() on Mac, compare ATI model names from OpenGL with those from IOKit only if coproc_debug flag is set.

- VBOX: Fix typo in Mac wrapper name (1686 -> i686).

- MGR: fix French translations of Remaining (estimated).

- client: When comparing ATI model names from OpenCL and IOKit on a Mac, substitute "AMD" for "ATI" because sometimes one API returns "ATI" but the other API returns "AMD".

- VBOX: Use the boinc_temporary_exit API properly. Wait for 5 minutes before allowing another attempt to start the VM when the hypervisor cannot allocate enough memory.

- VBOX: Print out a trace statement about the suspend/resume directive from the vboxwrapper perspective. This in conjuction with the BOINC API trace statements should provide a better idea with what is going on.

- client: On Mac only, update ATI available RAM after getting ATI total RAM size from OpenGL.

- client: on each scheduler RPC, make sure that files flagged as executable in the reply, and that are present, are actually executable.

- client: when killing a task, don't delete its shmem or change its state. These mess up the logic for dealing with exited processes, resulting in incorrect log messages.

- VBOX: Give the VM process a short priority boost when responding to a quit request. On older XP machines it might speed up the memory dump to disk.

- client: Increase the quit request timeout from 10 seconds to 60 seconds for machines running VMs and slow disk drives. It should give the VM enough time to gracefully shutdown and not give boinc reason to kill the wrapper.

7.0.22 change log

- client: use %g to format job resources (#CPUs, #GPUs). This suppresses trailing zeroes and (if integer) the . (decimal point)

- client: changes to job scheduling policy: fix bug that could greatly overcommit CPUs if there are several EDF jobs and several non-EDF GPU jobs don't overcommit CPUs if any job is MT (MT means avg_ncpus > 1).
For example, on a 4-CPU machine we will run: a 0.5-CPU GPU job and 4 1-CPU jobs but not a 0.5-CPU GPU job and 1 4-CPU job

- MGR: Fix a Mac-only bug which sometimes failed to show the snooze icon after closing and opening the Manager windows. This was caused by having a second instance of CTaskBarIcon

Warning
This version contains a severe bug that does not allow GPU work to run when other (CPU) tasks are running in high priority. Run at your own risk only. v7.0.23 may have a fix.

7.0.23 change log

- client: small changes to make client compile on Android, and to report the platform as "arm-android". From Carl Christensen.

- client: job scheduling policy tweak: if CPUs are fully committed (e.g. with EDF jobs) allow GPU jobs but only up to CPU usage of ncpus+1

- client: Don't include VBox executive processes as non-BOINC CPU time. On some systems they use significant CPU time while VMs are running. TODO: do this only if we're actually running a VBox app

- client: if an app process exits because of a signal, don't show the "no finish file" message; not sure why this was there in the first place.

- client: if an app process exits because of a signal, show the signal correctly

- client: report completed results if a time-of-day network suspend is scheduled within the next 30 minutes

- client: Initialize buffer which is used to hold the temporary exit reason. If somebody didn't populate the reason when calling boinc_temporary_exit the buffer contained junk.

- client: set file ownership and permissions after an async verify. This was presumably the cause of the recent Einstein@home problem.

- client: set file ownership and permissions after an async copy.

- client: set file ownership and permissions after a regular (non-async) copy. The latter 2 bugs would affect a VM app that copies its executable to slot/x/shared

- client: change timeout for job quit/abort from 60 back to 15 (time between sending app a quit/abort message and, if not exited yet, killing it)

- client: if app has reported an "other PID" (e.g., vboxwrapper reports the VBoxHeadless PID) then include it (along with descendants) in the list of processes we kill when killing the job.

7.0.24 change log

- client/server: add optional <dont_use_dcf/> to schedule reply. If set, client won't use DCF for this project. Make this the default in server code; we now do runtime estimation entirely on the server side, and the client-side mechanism is counterproductive.

- client: if a job calls boinc_temporary_exit() 100 times, abort it. Otherwise it could keep doing it forever (e.g. if there's not ever enough available GPU RAM)

- client/server: estimate FLOPS for NVIDIA GPUs with compute capability 3.x. Not sure if the parameters are right (128 cores/proc, 2 flops/clock) but they're better than nothing.

- compile fix for redhat, from Steffen Moller

- client: report results if CPU suspend pending in next 30 min

- client: set PROJECT::last_upload_start whenever an upload starts, not just when a result becomes ready to upload. Fix bug where a scheduler RPC to report results is done even though uploads are active.

- client: cpu_sched_debug enables messages about not scheduling jobs because of insufficient RAM

- client/server: set cores/proc for NVIDIA compute capability 3.0 to 192 Why can't NVIDIA provide an API for this?????

- client: fix typo that prevented GPU jobs from running if CPUs were filled with EDF jobs

- client: fix bug where if we sent app a <quit> message, and it timed out and we killed it, we'd treat it as a job error. (This was a major bug).

- API: remove BOINC_STATUS::suspend_request. I meant to do this before.

- client: fix bug in reading reason for temporary exit

- lib: fix a valgrind warning

- client/scheduler: fix error in NVIDIA peak flops calculation

- Mac installer: When checking for duplicate group membership entries, count only whole words (preceded and followed by white space) so that if we have both 'jon' and 'jones' we don't count 'jon' twice.

- Mac uninstaller: Use Directory Services to find the user names of all human users instead of stepping through the entries in the /Users directory.

- client: Fix idle detection during fast user switching. See comments in HOST_INFO::users_idle() for details.

---

BOINC blog

7.0.25 change log

- MGR: Revert my changes of 18 March to Mac Task Bar Icon because the second instance is needed to handle our Dock menu. Fix the earlier problem of losing the suspended icon by ensuring that we always call the same instance of CTaskBarIcon::SetIcon().

It is there for all platforms, even though the above change is a Mac only one. I guess they wanted us all to start at the same version number.

They are expecting to make this one the release version. Apparently they are just updating documentation to match it.

7.0.25 change log

- MGR: Revert my changes of 18 March to Mac Task Bar Icon because the second instance is needed to handle our Dock menu. Fix the earlier problem of losing the suspended icon by ensuring that we always call the same instance of CTaskBarIcon::SetIcon().

It is there for all platforms, even though the above change is a Mac only one. I guess they wanted us all to start at the same version number.

They are expecting to make this one the release version. Apparently they are just updating documentation to match it.

I looked and it is not yet on the list of avilable downloads, maybe it is too early yet.

It's there now. I suggest anyone using a previous 7.x client move to 7.0.25.

- 7.0.28 is the recommended client as of July 2012. 7.0.31 is for Alpha testers only (as in don't use it).

---

FAQ's

HOW TO:
- Opt out of Beta Tests
- Ask for Help