When I went to do a File>Exit I found that the version of 7.16.3 that I got from the repository only has the options
New Boinc Manager Window
Select Computer
Close Window.

Shut down Connected Client and Exit Boinc are both missing.

I guess I shall be reminding myself what dependencies I need to install before being able to roll my own again. Or wait till Ubuntu catches up.

There is a strong push coming from the Linux repository maintainers (not from BOINC) to remove a lot of the user controls from Linux versions of BOINC.

Their view - I think coming from a 'large, secure, organisation' point of view - is that users don't and shouldn't have low-level administration rights over the computer on their desks: sudo is strongly frowned upon, and root access is a complete no-no. They want BOINC to run as a service, and for the minions in their sweatshops not to be able to stop BOINC from running under any circumstances.

That's fine for their particular use-case, where running BOINC is a high-level corporate decision. But I am fighting a lone battle to persuade them that there are other Linux users out here - home users, who are the personal owners of the machine in question, with full authority, and perforce acting as their own sysadmin. There is some support for this view from the BOINC side of the table, but not enough yet.

There is a strong push coming from the Linux repository maintainers (not from BOINC) to remove a lot of the user controls from Linux versions of BOINC.

My main problem with it is that the exit dialogue has now gone. Now I will need to run Top or something to see if client is still running when I stop the manager. If it doesn't stop the client, I will need to go to the command line to do so either using boinccmd or the kill command.

Removing the exit dialogue is at least in my mind a retrograde step.

Edit: Thank you for fighting our corner!

They're getting as bad as Microsoft.

Removing the Exit/stop features shows a degree of arrogance or ignorance on behalf of the developers - with Linux appearing to gain traction for various reasons removing such useful tools is a highly retrograde step.
More power to Richard's elbow in pushing for the very rapid re-introduction of these functions.

I got the initial BOINC source implementation reverted, but it was re-implemented as a downstream patch by the Linux deployment team.

I got the initial BOINC source implementation reverted, but it was re-implemented as a downstream patch by the Linux deployment team.

Can you point me to the right zip to download to get it back?

I got the initial BOINC source implementation reverted, but it was re-implemented as a downstream patch by the Linux deployment team.

Can you point me to the right zip to download to get it back?

The reversion of the original BOINC code change can be found in https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/pull/3106 - there are links in that PR back to the original change and the motivation for it. There are links to the Debian and Fedora patch lists in https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/issues/3260.

I believe that the https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/tree/client_release/7/7.16 branch of BOINC's own code is clean in this respect, although it's still subject to testing and I don't think we've got all the bugs out of it yet.

I believe that the https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/tree/client_release/7/7.16 branch of BOINC's own code is clean in this respect, although it's still subject to testing and I don't think we've got all the bugs out of it yet.

Thanks Richard - Now struggling to get past make stage

gtk/gtk.h: No such file or directory
17 | #include <gtk/gtk.h>
I have installed libgtk-3.0-dev but still getting this error. Also strange it isn't being picked up by ./configure

I believe that the https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/tree/client_release/7/7.16 branch of BOINC's own code is clean in this respect, although it's still subject to testing and I don't think we've got all the bugs out of it yet.

Thanks Richard - Now struggling to get past make stage

gtk/gtk.h: No such file or directory
17 | #include <gtk/gtk.h>
I have installed libgtk-3.0-dev but still getting this error. Also strange it isn't being picked up by ./configure

I built 7.16.3 a couple of days ago on my distro-of-choice - PCLinuxOS. Initially I saw exactly the same error message and on checking my notes from previous builds together with the current configure output, I worked out that I had neglected to install lib64-curl-devel and a brand new lib called wayland-protocols-devel. This latter one was evidently needed from what I gleaned from the configure output.

So after installing these two and restarting with a fresh checkout, it all built fine. I don't actually know which of the two libs got rid of the missing gtk/gtk.h problem. I've been running this new version without problems for a few days now on a test machine. Obviously, the libs you need will probably be named somewhat differently but hopefully the PCLOS names will give you a clue about what to look for. To build BOINC, I needed to install over 150 tools/libs on what is a quite minimalist system that I use for crunching. If you get desperate, I could easily supply that full list so you could possibly work out anything else that might be missing from your build system.

---

Cheers,
Gary.

As a side note about building the latest BOINC version, I'd like to comment about something else that's been 'fixed' for my builds. On previous builds I've done (eg 7.14.2) snippets from the event log look like the following:-

Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:27 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:27 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Requesting new tasks for AMD/ATI GPU]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:32 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Scheduler request completed: got 2 new tasks]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:34 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Started download of templates_LATeah1062L11_0364_7323190.dat]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:34 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Started download of templates_LATeah1062L11_0364_7324821.dat]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:36 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Finished download of templates_LATeah1062L11_0364_7323190.dat]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:36 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Finished download of templates_LATeah1062L11_0364_7324821.dat]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:56 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Computation for task LATeah1062L09_396.0_0_0.0_5504625_2 finished]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:57 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Starting task LATeah1062L10_404.0_0_0.0_14980735_2]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:59 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Started upload of LATeah1062L09_396.0_0_0.0_5504625_2_0]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:56:59 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Started upload of LATeah1062L09_396.0_0_0.0_5504625_2_1]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:57:02 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Finished upload of LATeah1062L09_396.0_0_0.0_5504625_2_0]]>
Mon 28 Oct 2019 06:57:02 PM EST | Einstein@Home | <![CDATA[Finished upload of LATeah1062L09_396.0_0_0.0_5504625_2_1]]>

On the latest build, all the extraneous opening and closing square brackets and CDATA stuff are gone. The event log is much cleaner now :-). Many thanks to whoever/whatever sorted all that out :-).

---

Cheers,
Gary.

Thought I had posted what got me past the gtk error

Edit: It was a rookie error.

sudo apt-get install gtk2+-dev

Was the one. I had assumed the latest gtk3 would be the one, not realising that code that called on one wouldn't work with the more recent one.

... I had assumed the latest gtk3 would be the one ...

Don't know why you had a problem with that. lib64gtk3.0-devel (3.24.12-1pclos2019) was the only gtk lib I had installed so seems unlikely to be due to some gtk2/gtk3 incompatibility. I'm not a programmer so wouldn't really have a clue about things like that :-).

---

Cheers,
Gary.

... I had assumed the latest gtk3 would be the one ...

Don't know why you had a problem with that. lib64gtk3.0-devel (3.24.12-1pclos2019) was the only gtk lib I had installed so seems unlikely to be due to some gtk2/gtk3 incompatibility. I'm not a programmer so wouldn't really have a clue about things like that :-).

Not a programmer either but make wouldn't run until I installed 2.x alongside the 3.0-dev package on Ermine.

Presumably if I were a programmer I would stand a better chance of understanding. :)