Seeing that 'classic' seti was going to go bye bye on December 17th, I jumped unto this boinc bandwagon and promptly crashed my computer!

Here are the relevant facts:
I installed boinc 5.2.7;
I am running win2k; pent 4; 512mb (current);
I defaulted all options (including boinc as my screensaver);
I walked away;
Came back and boinc screensaver was boincking on my screen (boring!);
I dragged my mouse to re-log in and waited..
and waited.. and waited... and waited... (get the picture?!)

I had to reboot my machine!?

any suggestions?

---

Did you attach to the Seti project? Here's a nice how to.

---

Did you attach to the Seti project? Here's a nice how to.

Of course, and the boinc status screen showed it running.

The issue is why the boinc screensaver failed to stop running when I moved my mouse. It just froze.

---

Did you attach to the Seti project? Here's a nice how to.

Of course, and the boinc status screen showed it running.

The issue is why the boinc screensaver failed to stop running when I moved my mouse. It just froze.

I had the same difficulty. Mouse froze and I had to do the infamous ctrl-alt-del sequence to get the Windows XP sign-in screen.

On a side note, is the screen saver supposed to read "BOINC screensaver loading?"

---

On a side note, is the screen saver supposed to read "BOINC screensaver loading?"

Only for a moment... these all sound like problems with the screensaver. There may be a bug that needs to be looked at, but we'll need a lot more information. OS, BOINC Version and how installed, Project(s) attached, etc... Also, it would help if we could verify that the problems _only_ occur in the screensaver, so if you could turn it off, and see if everything works okay without it, that would help. Mine just installed and ran with no problems, as it does for most people, so if some of you are having issues, it's something specific to your installations that we need to identify so we can properly report the bug to the developers.

A note - the "BOINC screensaver" is just the one with the "bouncing BOINC" - it's supposed to be there only when there isn't a screensaver for the project you're currently running, in which case it defers to the project's code. So we also have to verify the problem is in the BOINC part and not in the project part.

---

On a side note, is the screen saver supposed to read "BOINC screensaver loading?"

Only for a moment... these all sound like problems with the screensaver. There may be a bug that needs to be looked at, but we'll need a lot more information. OS, BOINC Version and how installed, Project(s) attached, etc... Also, it would help if we could verify that the problems _only_ occur in the screensaver, so if you could turn it off, and see if everything works okay without it, that would help. Mine just installed and ran with no problems, as it does for most people, so if some of you are having issues, it's something specific to your installations that we need to identify so we can properly report the bug to the developers.

A note - the "BOINC screensaver" is just the one with the "bouncing BOINC" - it's supposed to be there only when there isn't a screensaver for the project you're currently running, in which case it defers to the project's code. So we also have to verify the problem is in the BOINC part and not in the project part.

Well, naturally fifteen minutes later it resolved. I wonder if Rosetta has no screensaver, as what I see now is BOINC and then two lines reading "rosetta 40%."

I also wonder why SETI doesn't appear to be doing any work, as I'd set the resources at 50% each. SETI@home is where I'd been for five years; I got their notice yesterday evening and switched per instructions.

WIN XP, BOINC 5.2.7, SETI and Rosetta projects attached. Downloaded the Windows 10mb version.

---

Well, naturally fifteen minutes later it resolved. I wonder if Rosetta has no screensaver, as what I see now is BOINC and then two lines reading "rosetta 40%."

I also wonder why SETI doesn't appear to be doing any work, as I'd set the resources at 50% each. SETI@home is where I'd been for five years; I got their notice yesterday evening and switched per instructions.

Rosetta's screensaver is still in "beta" - some WUs will display it, but most will not, so it'll fall to the BOINC one. In fact, the lockup you saw MAY have been due to a missing library in some early Rosetta WUs that used the screensaver. As for the work issue... would need a whole lot more information. Best bet is to select SETI in the Projects tab and hit "Update", then look in the Messages tab for any errors. If all it says is "not requesting any work", then you have enough work on hand from the other project that it can't safely get any SETI yet, but it will as soon as the others have been worked down a bit. If there is a problem with getting work, then we can look at that. BOINC requires about 10 WUs from each project to calculate a proper "Duration Correction Factor", so it'll take a bit to settle in.

Uh - obvious thing, but I'll ask just in case - you do know that unless you have multiple logical or physical CPUs, BOINC will only run one project at a time, and will switch between them... You may have SETI work on hand and "ready to run" but not currently executing. THAT should change within a couple of hours.

---

Well, naturally fifteen minutes later it resolved. I wonder if Rosetta has no screensaver, as what I see now is BOINC and then two lines reading "rosetta 40%."

I also wonder why SETI doesn't appear to be doing any work, as I'd set the resources at 50% each. SETI@home is where I'd been for five years; I got their notice yesterday evening and switched per instructions.

Rosetta's screensaver is still in "beta" - some WUs will display it, but most will not, so it'll fall to the BOINC one. In fact, the lockup you saw MAY have been due to a missing library in some early Rosetta WUs that used the screensaver. As for the work issue... would need a whole lot more information. Best bet is to select SETI in the Projects tab and hit "Update", then look in the Messages tab for any errors. If all it says is "not requesting any work", then you have enough work on hand from the other project that it can't safely get any SETI yet, but it will as soon as the others have been worked down a bit. If there is a problem with getting work, then we can look at that. BOINC requires about 10 WUs from each project to calculate a proper "Duration Correction Factor", so it'll take a bit to settle in.

Uh - obvious thing, but I'll ask just in case - you do know that unless you have multiple logical or physical CPUs, BOINC will only run one project at a time, and will switch between them... You may have SETI work on hand and "ready to run" but not currently executing. THAT should change within a couple of hours.

Ah. I am now fully enlightened. ;) I am now seeing SETI's screensaver; I assume that when Rosetta's is up and running and my machine happens to be processing Rosetta's data when I wander off that I'll see the screensaver specific to that project.

Thanks for the help.

---

Problem solved.... sort of.

I have determined that the boinc screensaver (ss) attempts to access the Internet and my Zonealarm firewall was blocking it.

When I first selected the boinc-ss (right click on the win2k desktop to open the display properties window) it had tried to access the Internet and I granted it permission, but I had not told Zonealarm to 'remember' my grant. The boinc-ss successfully activated after the allotted time. But, as I previously reported, locked up when I dragged my mouse to access my computer again. Apparently it tries to access the Internet again as it comes out of ss mode.

Once I told Zonealarm to remember the boinc-ss; it worked fine (sortf...). Dragging my mouse got me to my desktop without any problem. I say sort of to this as well, because I noticed that the boinc-ss now displayed a star field simulation overlaid by a floating Seti status window. But, (and this is the sortof) the Seti window does not show the cool Seti analysis display I have come to love.

Thank goodness the boinc-ss does not require continuous connection to the Internet; I am on a slow dialup line. But why should it at all??? It’s a screensaver! It should not require access to the Internet and especially not when coming out of ss-mode. This is poor design. Recovering from ss-mode should not be dependant on anything. After all the ‘anything’ could have failed, locked up, etc while in ss-mode and the last thing you want is your ss blocking you from getting to your computer and fixing the problem. Not to mention saving all the other work in progress.

PS: is there an FAQ? Or reported problems list for this project yet?

---

Thank goodness the boinc-ss does not require continuous connection to the Internet; I am on a slow dialup line.

PS: is there an FAQ? Or reported problems list for this project yet?

This thread is good basic info, and the Wiki is the repository of all knowledge...

If you are on slow dialup, the best advice that I can give you is to go under the Commands menu and set "Network activity suspended". Then you can control exactly when BOINC will connect - just make network activity available when you are ready for it. If you set your "connect to every" prefs setting to something like 2 days (please don't go higher immediately... get at least 10 WUs from each project you're attached to run first, then you can go up to 4 or even 6 safely - some will say 10, but that seems to cause problems for others) you won't run out of work between connections.

The screensaver itself does no network connection - my guess is that when the screensaver ends, control is going back to the BOINC daemon, and it is seeing that it should have connected sometime while you were away from the computer, and is trying immediately. As for why it would show the starfield and not the SETI graphics, you'd have to ask that on the SETI boards.

And advice for ALL new users - forget the screensaver until you are sure everything else is working correctly, THEN get the screensaver going. Trying to debug two pieces at the same time is confusing...

---

Michael said;

>The screensaver itself does no network connection - my guess is that when the >screensaver ends, control is going back to the BOINC daemon, and it is seeing >that it should have connected sometime while you were away from the computer, >and is trying immediately.

Sorry Michael, but your going to have to take that up with my Zonealarm firewall. It has an entry for boinc.scr; without which the scr locks up my computer. I have also determined that I don't need to have an 'active' internet/dialup connection for it to work properly.

Maybe boinc.scr is trying to access my 'intranet' which I don't have. I'll play some more with it after thanksgiving.

happy turkey to all

---

Sorry Michael, but your going to have to take that up with my Zonealarm firewall. It has an entry for boinc.scr; without which the scr locks up my computer. I have also determined that I don't need to have an 'active' internet/dialup connection for it to work properly.

Maybe boinc.scr is trying to access my 'intranet' which I don't have. I'll play some more with it after thanksgiving.

boinc.scr is only 156KB... I've never heard of _it_ needing to have open ports before. Maybe I'm paranoid, but can you look in c:\\windows at boinc.scr properties and verify the version and create date? Mine is version 5.2.7.0 created Nov 7, 2005. If yours is significantly larger, or doesn't "look right", I think I'd trash that file and re-download BOINC, installing as an update (5.2.8 is just out, no changes for Windows other than some localization strings). I have heard on one project that members of a German(?) BOINC team got emails from "BOINC admin" titled "Account_Information" that actually contained a virus and not anything valid, and wasn't from any legitimate BOINC-related site. Obviously somebody taking advantage of the switch from Classic.

Devs?

---

Michael said;

>The screensaver itself does no network connection - my guess is that when the >screensaver ends, control is going back to the BOINC daemon, and it is seeing >that it should have connected sometime while you were away from the computer, >and is trying immediately.

Sorry Michael, but your going to have to take that up with my Zonealarm firewall. It has an entry for boinc.scr; without which the scr locks up my computer. I have also determined that I don't need to have an 'active' internet/dialup connection for it to work properly.

Maybe boinc.scr is trying to access my 'intranet' which I don't have. I'll play some more with it after thanksgiving.

happy turkey to all

The BOINC software communicates with itself using messages that appear to be network traffic to some firewalls.

boinc.exe needs internet access on ports 80 and 43, and local access on ports 1043 and 31416.
boincmgr.exe and boinccmd.exe need local access on ports 1043 and 31416.
boinc.scr may need local access on ports 1043 and 31416.

---

BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8