BOINC 6.2.12 released for Macintosh

Charlie Fenton wrote:

I have posted BOINC 6.2.12 for the Macintosh to the alpha download page.

Remember: as of version 6, BOINC for the Mac now requires at least OS 10.3.9.

Cheers,
--Charlie

BOINC 6.2.13 released for Windows and Windows x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Howdy Folks,

Here is another release candidate. The big change for this release is that at the end of installation, if a reboot is required, the installer gives you a choice on whether you want to reboot now, or wait till later. If you choose to wait until later, BOINC Manager will throw an error if you launch it until you reboot.


Please log test results to http://boinc.berkeley.edu/alpha

Thanks in advance.

----- Rom

Change Log:

- MGR: Fix the application name for both views.
NOTE: the data type 'char' should NOT be used within the various views. This is the classic example of how direct data access messes things up in projects with many developers. Use wxString with the PrintF method instead.

- MGR: Fix build breaks from the above changes: pass a C string, not a wxString to the PrintF method.

- client: Fix build breaks on Mac due to removal of headers from cpp.h.

- MGR: Fix the application name for both views.
(ANSI/Unicode compatible)(VS/GCC compatible)

- CC: Read the config file before setting the max file sizes.

- MGR: Fix small bug when displaying the active task count in the taskbar.

- WINSETUP: Create a flag file that can be used to keep either the manager or the CC from starting until a reboot has been performed. Flag the file for deletion after a reboot has been performed.

- WINSETUP: Don't create the flag file until after the migration phase has been completed.

- WINSETUP: Use real quotes around the delete file command instead of tick marks, the Windows shell throws an error.

- WINSETUP: Instead of calling the Windows API to determinethe various special folders, use the MSI properties which match the 'choose folder' dialog. We can skip the step if doing a case insensitive compare. Plus it appears that MSI normalizes the paths for us.

- MGR: Detect when a reboot is required for BOINC and display an error dialog if it is required.

- WINSETUP: Revamp the various strings used.

BOINC 6.2.13 Addendum

Skip testing this version, there is something wrong with the reboot option.

BOINC 6.2.14 released for Windows and Windows x64

Rom Walton wrote:

If you installed .13 you’ll need to uninstall it from the Control Panel, and then delete the RebootPending.txt file for the program directory (i.e. C:\Program Files\BOINC).

This release contains the following fix:

- WINSETUP: Don't execute the custom action that creates the RebootPending.txt file in the program directory if a reboot isn't required.

BOINC 6.2.14 released for Macintosh

Charlie Fenton wrote:

I have posted BOINC 6.2.14 for the Macintosh to the alpha download page.

Remember: as of version 6, BOINC for the Mac now requires at least OS 10.3.9.

Note that Rom's instructions about installing and the RebootPending.txt file apply only to the Windows version; they are not relevant to the mac version.

Cheers,
--Charlie

BOINC 6.2.14 released for Linux and Linux x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Linux builds are now released.


----- Rom

Imminent public release of BOINC 6.2.14

Rom Walton wrote:

Okay, unless somebody finds a show stopper, we will be releasing the first of the 6.2.x clients to the public on Monday.

That’ll give me time to update the release notes and give the FAQ service time to localize the new stuff.

BOINC 6.2.15 released for Windows, Windows x64, and Mac OS X

Rom Walton wrote:

Howdy Folks,

This release contains localization updates as well as a bug fix for the screensaver when you are using the CPU throttling preference.

Please report test results to http://boinc.berkeley.edu/alpha

Thanks in advance.

----- Rom

Change log:

- MGR: Code which tests for reboot required should be Windows-only.

- SEA: Change references of boinc_cmd to boinccmd

- SCR: Don't treat CPU throttling as BOINC being suspended.
Fixes #706

- MGR: If the reminder frequency is 0, then don't show any reminder messages.

- SCR / CLIENT: fix get_screensaver_tasks RPC so it does not exclude tasks suspended for CPU throttling. Fixes the screensaver problem for V6 graphics. Checked into boinc_core_release_6_2_15 tag.

BOINC 6.2.16 released for Windows and Windows x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Howdy Folks,

I believe I have found and fixed the keyboard and mouse activity detection issue. Since it is a relatively small change over .15 we are thinking of going straight to a public release with it.

For those who have the time over the next few hours, could you give it a go? Make sure keyboard and mouse activity detection still works in your usage scenario as well as most anything else you do.

Thanks in advance.

----- Rom

Change Log:

- CLIENT/MGR/TRAY: When installed on Vista and UAC is turned on the user by default cannot create globally shared objects. This becomes a problem when protected application mode is turned off for keyboard and mouse detection. Basically all of the components would start up and fail to create the shared memory segment and report the error through stderr which most people don't look at by default.

The client is now the only component that is allowed to create the shared memory segment, if creating the global segment fails it'll create a local one instead. Both the tray and manager now just attach to the existing segment, first trying the global one then the local one.

BOINC 6.2.17 released for Windows and Windows x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Howdy Folks,

We have a new release to test. Basically we had starting receiving many reporting stating that when a computer was coming out of a lower power state (hibernation, or sleep) that the BOINC screen saver and Astropulse would get stuck in a cycle where Astropulse would continuously be restarted. When the machine got into that state, they had to reboot the computer in order to actually use it again.

I spent some time going over the code and found that two important checks were being omitted during the startup of a graphics application and handling a shutdown of the graphics application. I fixed things so those checks happen all the time. I believe this will work around whatever the Astropulse issue really is. The two checks were meant as backup in case something happened and the graphics window misbehaved. One check, checked to see if a virus scanner or personal firewall alert popped up, if so it was to blow out of the screensaver. The other check was for keyboard or mouse activity, if any activity is detected it is to blow out of the screensaver.

Just to clarify, this bug I’m hunting appears to involve just Astropulse at the moment, but the changes I made should affect everybody equally.

I haven’t been able to test my fixes against Astropulse yet, I haven’t been able to get an Astropulse task.

I have updated the test reporting system to include this release. Please report test results to http://boinc.berkeley.edu/alpha/

TIA.

------ Rom

Change Log:

- Mac Installer: fix bugs in script which converts BOINC installer to a GridRepublic installer.

- Update copyright strings in various Windows resource files.

- WIN: Update OS Detection code.
NOTE: Holy cow, Between Vista and Server 2008 there are now 26 different SKUs.

- WINSCR: Certain checks should be done regularly like keyboard/mouse activity and the notification window check. They should not depend on whether or not the graphics window has been displayed or not.

---

BOINC 6.2.18 released for Windows and Windows x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Howdy Folks,

I’ve gone ahead and released this build straight to the public. This build contained three fixes.

I was able to verify the BOINCTray.exe issue and the shared-mem and handle leaks. I’m not sure how any of us could test the client crash scenario, I ran through the basic battery of tests against BOINC Alpha. I guess we’ll just have to let the people who discovered it, let us know if the problem is fixed.

If you see people reporting this message in the forums have them upgrade to this build:

<message>
Can't get shared memory segment name: shmget() failed
</message>

Thanks in advance.

----- Rom

Change Log:

- WINSETUP: For some reason BOINCTray.exe was only being installed when the 'Protected Applcation Mode' was selected. I don't remember why we did this, so install it on all scenarios.

- client: fix crash in this scenario:
* A file upload sends request.
* The network is down, and something (e.g. a router) sends a long (> 4KB) error page. This overruns the 4KB buffer of HTTP_OP::req1.
Solution: keep track of the size of the buffer, and don't overrun it.
Also move the body of a huge for loop into a separate function.
From Ian Hay. Fixes #705

- client: don't leak handles to shared-mem files

- client: don't leak process handles when abort jobs

- client: if an app exits or we kill it, always destroy the shmem segment.

BOINC 6.2.18 released for Macintosh

Charlie Fenton wrote:

I have posted BOINC 6.2.18 for the Macintosh to the download page.
As with the Windows build, we have released this directly to the
public.

Cheers,
--Charlie

Benchmark errors

If you run into benchmark errors the first time after BOINC starts up, this is known to the developers and they are looking into what is causing it. When you or BOINC reruns the benchmarks eventually, they will run correctly.

BOINC 6.2.19 for Windows and Windows x64

Change Log:

- SCR: Fix 8/14 checkin that causes the CPU util to spike on Macs and possibly Windows.

- client: fix compiler warning.

- Mac lib: set visibility of symbols to hidden by default.

- client: coprocessor support isn't supported in 6.2.

- SCR: Fix GDI/Memory leak in the screen saver. Pointed out by David Barnard.

- winsetup: Change the delete file after reboot code to use MoveFileEx instead of the RunOnce registry key. It does what I was originally trying to do directly to:

HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\PendingFileRenameOperations

But I ran into issues across various versions of Windows.
Thanks to Nicolas Alvarez for pointing out the API.

6.2.19 addendum

Charlie Fenton wrote:

None of these changes affect the Mac, they are all Windows-only
(except for a very minor change removing a message about coprocessor
support). So we will not be releasing version 6.2.19 for the Mac;
6.2.18 remains the latest on the Mac.

Cheers,
--Charlie

The changes you see referring to the Macintosh in the change log of 6.2.19 were added to 6.2.18 on the Mac.

BOINC 6.3.14 released for Windows and Windows x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Howdy Folks,

We have a new version of the client to try out.

The big changes for this release are:

1. Properties dialog for the projects tab. (Currently broken but will be fixed in the next release, causes the manager to crash)

2. A new way of communicating between the manager and core client. (We shouldn’t see the manager appear to lock up any more)

3. We got rid of the Grid-Based views. (Now the advanced view is accessible all of the time)

4. GPU Scheduling supported for CUDA capable devices (You’ll need a recent Nvidia video card with the latest video drivers installed)

In order to test GPU Scheduling you’ll need to attach to http://www.ps3grid.net/ to download CUDA jobs.

NOTE: At present running CUDA enabled tasks is NOT compatible with the ‘protected application execution’ setup option, Nvidia is looking into it. You will need to disable ‘protected application execution’ in order to run CUDA enabled tasks.

Please log test results to http://boinc.berkeley.edu/alpha.

New versions for Linux will be out either today or tomorrow.

Thanks in advance.



----- Rom

6.3.14 Addendum

David Anderson wrote:

Another new feature: you can put <exclusive_app>wow.exe</exclusive_app> in your cc_config.xml file, and BOINC will suspend computing whenever wow.exe is running. See http://boinc.berkeley.edu/wiki/Client_configuration

BOINC 6.3.14 released for Macintosh

Charlie Fenton wrote:

I have posted BOINC 6.3.14 for the Macintosh to the download page.

This also should support CUDA devices, but only on those Intel Macs which do _not_ support 64-bit applications (either because they have older processors or are still running OS 10.4). This is because the CUDA libraries for the Mac are currently built only for Intel 32-bit architecture, not 64-bit (and not PowerPC). We have notified NVIDIA of this issue and asked them to look into it.

Mac OS X does not automatically come with the CUDA libraries; you must download them from the NVIDIA website and install them if you want them. There are not yet any CUDA-capable BOINC applications for the Mac, but SEI@home plans to release one soon.

Cheers,
--Charlie

BOINC 6.3.14 released for Linux and Linux x64

Rom Walton wrote:

Here are the Linux versions of the clients.

They should also support CUDA devices.


----- Rom

See this thread at GPUGrid for instructions of how to install CUDA drivers on Linux.

I'm giving a warning out on the use of this option. Do make sure that there are no other applications on your system that use the same executable name.

Since this option does not use a path, as the Windows API used does not supply the full path to the application, it is possible that starting bog-normal applications halt BOINC, due to the filename being in one of the <exclusive_app> tags in cc_config.xml

At this moment it is also possible to put in the executable names of BOINC or any project, rendering your BOINC useless as it will suspend itself for as long as that application is running. ;-)

I'm hoping that the developers fix this in a future version.

6.3.14 Addendum

David Anderson wrote:

Another new feature: you can put <exclusive_app>wow.exe</exclusive_app> in your cc_config.xml file, and BOINC will suspend computing whenever wow.exe is running. See http://boinc.berkeley.edu/wiki/Client_configuration