How To Install BOINC On Mandriva Linux

WHAT IS THIS WEB PAGE ABOUT?

Most of today's home computers are very fast and waste a lot of power waiting for you to do something. This idle power can be put to good use.

If you have an interest in donating your computer's spare idle CPU cycles for useful scientific research such as SETI@home (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence), Einstein@home (Search for Pulsars and Neutron Stars) or wish to donate your CPU idle time for other scientific projects then you will want to download and run BOINC (Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing).

The steps shown here allow you to install BOINC securely and to automatically start and run under it's own BOINC user account when your computer is turned on. The BOINC software in this HowTo is installed in directory /opt/BOINC instead of /home/boinc/BOINC. The reason for placing it here is so that user BOINC can run the client and any users that belong to BOINCG group can read, but not modify BOINC settings.

These steps work with Mandrake 10 up to and including Mandriva 2008. Included in this How-To guide are additional steps you need so that BOINC can run correctly on Mandriva's Higher "MSEC 4" server security level. You can skip many steps in this guide if you are running at a more Standard security level.

Please note that due to all the details mentioned above, this How-To is much more work than simply setting up BOINC to run under your own user account. If you want a more generic version of How-To compatible with other versions of Linux you have a great guide written by the original author for the BOINC script used in this setup. The general guide is shown on Eric Meyer's How To Guide. There are several other guides shown on the BOINC wiki.

SOME SUGGESTIONS IF INSTALLING BOINC ON A NEW COMPUTER

Skip this section if you already have installed Linux. If you plan to run a Linux file server and have not installed Linux yet, I suggest putting BOINC on a partition of it's own. The reasons for this suggestion is hard drive space, and backups.

Users may fill-up hard drive space to the point of not having room available for other programs to do their work. When you run out of room, it interferes with programs like BOINC. BOINC hard drive space requirements are somewhat steady (except for growing log files), so a small partition of 200MB, 500MB, or 1G is okay. If you have not used BOINC before and are not familiar with how much space some projects use, you may want to skip this suggestion.

When it comes to you making backups (except for occasional backups), making a backup of the BOINC working directory may not have value to you. The files are large and they change often. Putting BOINC at a location other than a default /home/user directory allows you to leave BOINC running and only turn it off if-and-when you decide to do a backup on the BOINC directory. It also makes your backup of home directories far simpler too because you can simply backup /home/* and not some other combination with complicated exclusions and exceptions to skip directories like /home/user/BOINC.

As you can see in the partial script example below, if you make backups, and are using steps similar to this tar backup script then you can make a simple modification to backup just once a month, and only stop BOINC when you actually do backup that BOINC partition or directory:

# Create Monthly Backups on 1st day of each month if [ $DOM = "01" ]; then MakeFullMonthlyBackup "1" "$DIR1" >> $ERRFILE; MakeFullMonthlyBackup "2" "$DIR2" >> $ERRFILE; MakeFullMonthlyBackup "3" "$DIR3" >> $ERRFILE; # Stop BOINC. Make a monthly backup. Restart BOINC /sbin/service boinc stop MakeFullMonthlyBackup "BOINC" "/opt/BOINC" >> $ERRFILE; # Maybe rotate BOINC log files before starting BOINC? # Done, start BOINC /sbin/service boinc start fi

CREATE PACCESS & BOINCG GROUPS, THEN ADD A BOINC USER ACCOUNT

Ideally, you will want to create a BOINC account just for BOINC and give it few permissions to the rest of your computer. The various research projects only need a network connection and knowledge of available RAM. Future versions of BOINC may introduce interesting features so you may want to create a shared "read-only" BOINCG group for this purpose. If you follow the suggestion of putting BOINC in another directory, such as /opt/BOINC instead of /home/user/BOINC mentioned in the previous section, it will be easier for looking at BOINC using group boincg permission access.

This HowTo guide will be using groups named paccess, boincg and a new user account named boinc which belongs to nobody except boinc. If you want to use different names, please substitute where applicable.

Most of these steps can be done quickly on a command-line console (or shell). If you have not used a command-line console before you can usually find it by following your menu. It is likely located in "Mandriva->System->Terminals->Console".

Below are the steps you enter. Below that is information about each instruction used. This example assumes your user account is named you. Please substitute the user name of your account when required.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

[you@genesis ~]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis you]# groupadd -r paccess [root@genesis you]# groupadd boincg [root@genesis you]# useradd boinc -c BOINC -G boincg,paccess [root@genesis you]# passwd boinc Changing password for user boinc. New UNIX password: ******** Retype new UNIX password: ******** passwd: all authentication tokens updated successfully. [root@genesis you]# usermod -G boincg -a you [root@genesis you]# usermod -G paccess -a adm [root@genesis you]# exit                                              [you@genesis ~]$

1. su - The following commands need to be done in Super User mode. You will need the su password too.

2. groupadd -r paccess - You will need to add a paccess group if you will be running your computer at Higher "MSEC 4" security level since BOINC needs to read values in directory /proc.

   The reason for adding group paccess is so that BOINC can access /proc without needing adm rights to directory /proc.

3. groupadd boincg - Add group boincg if you want to add users that can read BOINC's data without giving permission to write modifications (You can skip this group addition).

4. useradd boinc -c BOINC -G boincg,paccess - Create a new user named boinc which also has access to groups boincg and paccess. User boinc will be used by the BOINC client and also by the BOINC manager programs.

5. passwd boinc - Add a password for user boinc.

6. usermod -G boincg -a you - You can skip this instruction, but do this if you want to have access to BOINC's data in the future. You need to insert your account name in place of you.

7. usermod -G paccess -a adm - Do this so that user adm can access directory /proc because you will later change it's directory permission.

8. exit - Exit. You no longer need to be in su mode (you can skip this exit and the next su commands if you are doing the next section).

ALLOW BOINC TO RUN AT HIGHER MSEC 4 LEVEL

If your computer will run using Standard "MSEC 2" or High "MSEC 3", you can skip this section. These steps are required to allow BOINC to run on Mandriva Higher "MSEC 4" Security Level because permissions on directories will change and some programs will be terminated automatically if they are found running.

You will need to edit a file and some directory settings in su mode, so open up a command line console and follow these steps.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

[you@genesis ~]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis you]# echo boinc >> /etc/security/msec/server.4 [root@genesis you]# kwrite /usr/share/msec/perm.4 [root@genesis you]# chown root.paccess /proc [root@genesis you]# exit                                              [you@genesis ~]$

1. su - The following commands need to be done in Super User mode. You will need the su password too.

2. echo boinc >> /etc/security/msec/server.4 - Append boinc to the list of programs allowed to run when a security check is done. boinc is the name of the script your computer will automatically run on startup.

3. kwrite /usr/share/msec/perm.4 - Select your favourite text editor if you prefer something other than KDE Kwrite. You will want to edit the perm.4 file so that group paccess can get into directory /proc. You will need this so that BOINC can check the status of the network and of RAM memory, otherwise it stops running.

   In file perm.4 you will want to edit the line containing /proc from:
   

   /proc root.adm 550

   change permissions to:

   /proc root.paccess 550

   and insert this new line for a new BOINC directory:

   /opt/BOINC boinc.boincg 750

4. chown root.paccess /proc - After you changed the security setting in file perm.4, it is now okay to change the /proc directory permission.

5. exit - Exit. You no longer need to be in su mode (you can skip this exit and the next su commands if you are doing the next section).

ADJUST YOUR HOSTS FILE TO REFLECT YOUR COMPUTER NAME TO THE BOINC SERVERS

You Can skip this section if you want. This is just a minor issue seen with BOINC version 5.8.xx. You may want to adjust your /etc/hosts file so that BOINC reports back the name you expect. Some /etc/hosts files have local as the first name in a list of names. Move your expected computer name to the front of this list. You will need to change this in su mode.

1. 2. 3. 4.

[you@genesis ~]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis you]# kwrite /etc/hosts [root@genesis you]# exit                                              [you@genesis ~]$ exit

1. su - The following commands need to be done in Super User mode. You will need the su password too.

2. kwrite /etc/hosts - Select your favourite text editor if you prefer something other than KDE Kwrite. You will want to edit the /etc/hosts file so that your computer name is the first name in the list.

   Here is an example before you edit the file:
   

   127.0.0.1 localhost genesis GENESIS

   This is after you move your computer name to the front:

   127.0.0.1 genesis localhost GENESIS

3. exit - Exit. You no longer need to be in su mode.

4. exit - You are done. You will be switching to user BOINC next, so exit this command-line console.

SWITCH TO USER BOINC AND GO GET THE LATEST BOINC

At this point, you are ready to get the files needed. Log out of your user account and log into the BOINC user account. Once you have logged into your computer's BOINC user account, open up an Internet web browser and Download the latest stable BOINC file to your DeskTop or your ~ ( /home/boinc/ ) directory.

RUN THE SCRIPT, EDIT SOME SETTINGS

The latest version of BOINC at the time this How-To was written was version 5.8.16, so this How-To will use 5.8.16 for the following steps. In this section, you will change to directory /opt and build the BOINC directory and files, then set group permissions to boincg.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

[boinc@genesis ~]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis boinc]# chmod 777 /opt [root@genesis boinc]# exit [boinc@genesis ~]$ cd /opt [boinc@genesis opt]$ sh ~/Desktop/boinc_5.8.16_i686-pc-linux-gnu.sh [boinc@genesis opt]$ kwrite BOINC/run_manager [boinc@genesis opt]$ chmod 550 BOINC/run_manager.sh [boinc@genesis opt]$ ln -s /opt/BOINC/run_manager.sh ~/Desktop/boinc.sh [boinc@genesis opt]$ chown boinc:boincg -R BOINC [boinc@genesis opt]$ chmod -R g-w,o-rwx BOINC [boinc@genesis opt]$ chmod -R g+r BOINC/*.png [boinc@genesis opt]$ chmod -R g+r BOINC/locale* [boinc@genesis opt]$ chmod g+rx BOINC/boincmgr [boinc@genesis opt]$ chmod 750 BOINC [boinc@genesis opt]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis opt]# chmod 755 /opt [root@genesis opt]# exit                                             [boinc@genesis opt]$

1. su - You will need to change permissions on directory /opt so that you can install BOINC there. You will need the su password too.

2. chmod 777 /opt - Allow user boinc to install files in this directory. Older versions of Linux might not have an /opt directory, in which case, you will need to create it using command md /opt

3. exit - Exit. You need to run the script as user boinc so that related files and scripts belong to BOINC.

4. cd /opt - Change to the /opt directory so that you can create the BOINC files here.

5. sh /home/boinc/Desktop/boinc_5.8.16_i686-pc-linux-gnu.sh - Run the boinc script (substitute the name of the version you downloaded if it is not 5.8.16).

   This will create a directory named BOINC/ with the following files of interest:

   boinc	BOINC core client. This program will be run as a daemon using a start-up script supplied later.
   boincmgr	BOINC manager. This program manages the client program, shows stats and is used for choosing projects. It is best to run this using the run_manager script.
   run_client	A script that cd's into the BOINC directory and runs the core client. This script should be renamed to run_client.sh if you want Konqueror to automatically recognize it as a script, but since this How-to will setup your computer to start BOINC on power-up, this script is not really needed then (we will not modify it or rename it).
   run_manager	A script that cd's into the BOINC directory and runs the manager. This script should be renamed to run_manager.sh so that Konqueror can automatically recognize it as a script. Then it will be edited using Kwrite.

6. kwrite BOINC/run_manager - If you are running KDE as your graphical DeskTop, you may want to edit the run_manager script so that if you click on the file using the Konqueror file browser it will actually run. Add the first line ( #!/bin/sh ) shown.
   

   #!/bin/sh cd "/opt/BOINC" && exec ./boincmgr $@

   As a suggestion, you may want to save the edited file as run_manager.sh with an added .sh to the end of the file name if you are running an older version of Mandrake or Mandriva to help Konqueror recognize this file as a script.

7. chmod 550 BOINC/run_manager.sh - If you saved the script with the added .sh on the end of the file name, you will need to make the file executable because Kwrite saves files as default read/write (executable bit not set).

8. ln -s /opt/BOINC/run_manager.sh /home/boinc/Desktop/boinc.sh - Create a Desktop shortcut to the script that runs the BOINC manager. This shortcut will be used later to join into projects after BOINC is setup and ready to go. Use the full path name of /opt/BOINC/run_manager.sh and not a shorter version description to ensure the correct path is used.

9. chown boinc:boincg -R BOINC - Change the group ownership to boincg. Any user that belongs to group boincg can look at the files.

10. chmod -R g-w,o-rwx BOINC - Change permissions so that group boincg cannot edit files and so that other users have no access to the files.

11. chmod -R g+r BOINC/*.png - If you want group access to boinc manager then you need these png tiles.

12. chmod -R g+r BOINC/locale* - Needed if you want group access to boinc manager.

13. chmod g+rx BOINC/boincmgr - Do this if you want to allow the group to run boinc manager.

14. chmod 750 BOINC - Change permissions on the BOINC directory so that it is only accessible by user boinc or group boincg.

15. su - You will need to change permissions on directory /opt back to it's previous setting.

16. chmod 755 /opt - Restore settings on directory /opt.

17. exit - Exit. You no longer need to be in su mode.

GET THE INIT SCRIPT, EDIT BOINC SCRIPT IF NECESSARY

If you want BOINC to automatically start when your computer is turned-on, you will need an init daemon script such as this one. Download this script file, or copy this script below. If you are not using Mandriva, you may want to use a more generic script and edit it to match your setup, for example, use this one Eric Meyer's Script.

If you prefer to copy and paste to a script called boinc then copy the listing below.

#!/bin/sh # # BOINC - start and stop the BOINC client daemon on Unix # # Unix start/stop script to run the BOINC client as a daemon at # system startup, as the 'boinc' user (not root!). # # This version works on Red Hat Linux, Fedora Core, Mandriva, # and Slackware Linux, and should work on generic Linux systems # provided they have 'pidof'. Metadata for chkconfig and the SUSE # equivalent INIT info are included below. # # Usage: boinc { start | stop | restart | status } # #### # chkconfig: 345 98 03 # description: This script starts the local BOINC client as a daemon \ # BOINC lets you donate your idle computer time to science \ # projects like SETI@home, Climateprediction.net, Rosetta@home, \ # World Community Grid, and many others. \ # For more info about BOINC (the Berkeley Open Infrastructure \ # for Network Computing) see http://boinc.ssl.berkeley.edu # processname: boinc # config: /etc/sysconfig/boinc # ### BEGIN INIT INFO # Provides: boinc # Required-Start: $network # Required-Stop: $network # Default-Start: 3 4 5 # Default-Stop: 0 1 2 6 # Short-Description: BOINC client daemon initialization script # Description: This script starts the local BOINC client as a daemon \ # BOINC lets you donate your idle computer time to science \ # projects like SETI@home, Climateprediction.net, Rosetta@home, \ # World Community Grid, and many others. \ # For more info about BOINC (the Berkeley Open Infrastructure \ # for Network Computing) see http://boinc.ssl.berkeley.edu ### END INIT INFO # # Eric Myers - 27 July 2004 # Department of Physics and Astronomy, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie NY # Eric Myers # Spy Hill Research, Poughkeepsie, New York # # Jose Da Silva - 27 October 2007 # Minor changes plus used LSB type error return codes 0..7 # # @(#) $Id: boinc,v 1.8.2 2007/10/27 01:01:01 Joses Exp $ ######################################################################## # Defaults, these can be overridden in /etc/sysconfig/boinc BOINCUSER=boinc BOINCDIR=/opt/BOINC BOINCEXE=boinc BOINCERR=0 # Additional BOINC options: # Be wary of -allow_remote_gui_rpc, as it can open your machine up # to the world if you don't set a password, or if you set a poor one. # Should be okay if you are behind a NAT firewall. #BOINCOPTS="-allow_remote_gui_rpc" # opens up your machine to the world! BOINCOPTS= # Log and error files (you should rotate these occasionally) #LOGFILE=boinc.log #ERRORLOG=error.log # Or if you are not using them at all, then send them to null LOGFILE=/dev/null ERRORLOG=/dev/null # Look for any local configuration settings which override all above if [ -f /etc/sysconfig/boinc ]; then . /etc/sysconfig/boinc elif [ -f /etc/default/boinc ]; then . /etc/default/boinc fi # Source function library. if [ -f /etc/init.d/functions ] ; then . /etc/init.d/functions elif [ -f /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions ] ; then . /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions else exit 0 fi # Direct paths to commands used in this script (no path searches needed) CHMOD=/bin/chmod CHOWN=/bin/chown ECHO=/bin/echo NICE=/bin/nice PIDOF=/sbin/pidof RM=/bin/rm SLEEP=/bin/sleep SU=/bin/su TOUCH=/bin/touch # Mandriva 2008 really wants a lock file located here ... if [ -d /var/lock/subsys ]; then LOCKDIR=/var/lock/subsys elif [ -d /var/lock ]; then LOCKDIR=/var/lock fi ## Locate the boinc directory and executable if [ ! -d $BOINCDIR ]; then $ECHO -n $"Cannot find the BOINC directory: ${BOINCDIR}" echo_failure $ECHO exit 5 fi if [ ! -x "$BOINCDIR/$BOINCEXE" ]; then $ECHO -n $"Cannot find the BOINC executable client: ${BOINCEXE}" echo_failure $ECHO exit 5 fi # Functions: $1 is one of start|stop|restart|status case "$1" in start) $0 stop cd $BOINCDIR if [ -f lockfile ]; then $ECHO -n $"Another BOINC is running here (lockfile exists)." echo_failure BOINCERR=3 fi if [ ! -f client_state.xml -o ! -d projects ]; then $ECHO -n $"This BOINC client requires initialization." echo_warning BOINCERR=6 fi $ECHO -n $"Starting BOINC service:" $NICE $SU $BOINCUSER -c "$BOINCDIR/$BOINCEXE $BOINCOPTS" >>$LOGFILE 2>>$ERRORLOG & $SLEEP 3 PID=`$PIDOF -s -x -o $$ -o $PPID -o %PPID $BOINCEXE` if [ $PID ]; then $TOUCH "$LOCKDIR/$BOINCEXE" echo_success else echo_failure BOINCERR=1 fi ;; stop) cd $BOINCDIR if [ ! -f lockfile -a ! -f "$LOCKDIR/$BOINCEXE" ]; then $ECHO -n $"${BOINCEXE} is not running (no lockfile found)." echo_success else $ECHO -n $"Stopping ${BOINCEXE} client daemon:" killproc $BOINCEXE && echo_success || echo_failure fi $RM -f lockfile $RM -f "$LOCKDIR/$BOINCEXE" ;; restart) $0 stop $0 start ;; status) PID=`$PIDOF -x -o $$ -o $$PPID -o %PPID boinc_client` if [ "$PID" == "" ]; then PID=`$PIDOF -x -o $$ -o $$PPID -o %PPID $BOINCEXE` fi if [ "$PID" != "" ]; then $ECHO -n $"${BOINCEXE} (pid $PID) is running..." echo_success #kill -SIGUSR1 $PID; else if [ -f "$BOINCDIR/lockfile" -o -f "$LOCKDIR/$BOINCEXE" ]; then $ECHO -n $"${BOINCEXE} is stopped but lockfile exists." echo_warning BOINCERR=7 else $ECHO -n $"${BOINCEXE} is not running!"; # Do not echo OK or FAIL. result may be okay, or not. fi fi ;; *) $ECHO $"Usage: ${0} {start|stop|restart|status}" exit 1 esac $ECHO exit $BOINCERR

You may need to edit BOINCDIR to fit your computer if you installed BOINC elsewhere other than /opt/BOINC.

INSERT THE BOINC SCRIPT IN THE INIT.D DIRECTORY, SET SERVICE

Save the file above in directory /etc/init.d as file boinc. The steps below assume you downloaded the file to your desktop.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

[boinc@genesis ~]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis boinc]# cp /home/boinc/Desktop/boinc /etc/init.d/boinc [root@genesis boinc]# chmod 550 /etc/init.d/boinc [root@genesis boinc]# chkconfig --add boinc [root@genesis boinc]# service boinc start boinc is not running (no lockfile found). [ OK ] Starting BOINC service: [ OK ] [root@genesis boinc]# ps -A -f | grep "boinc" root 5389 1 0 03:37 pts/1 /bin/su boinc -c /opt/BOINC/boinc boinc 5393 5389 0 03:37 pts/1 /opt/BOINC/boinc root 5683 5645 0 04:00 pts/1 grep --color boinc [root@genesis boinc]# exit                                            [boinc@genesis ~]$ exit

1. su - The following commands need to be done in Super User mode. You will need the su password too.

2. cp /home/boinc/Desktop/boinc /etc/init.d/boinc - You will need to copy the boinc script to the /etc/init.d directory.

3. chmod 550 /etc/init.d/boinc - The script needs to be set as an executable script.

4. chkconfig --add boinc - Add the script to the list of services run when your computer starts up.

5. service boinc start - Start the boinc client script. If you are not running Mandriva and do not have service then you will have to use chkconfig to start the BOINC client program:
   

   [root@genesis boinc]# chkconfig --level 345 boinc on [root@genesis boinc]# chkconfig --list boinc boinc 0:off 1:off 2:off 3:on 4:on 5:on 6:off [root@genesis boinc]# ls -l /etc/rc[0-6].d/*boinc* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc0.d/K03boinc -> ../init.d/boinc*  lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc1.d/K03boinc -> ../init.d/boinc* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc2.d/K03boinc -> ../init.d/boinc* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc3.d/S98boinc -> ../init.d/boinc* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc4.d/S98boinc -> ../init.d/boinc* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc5.d/S98boinc -> ../init.d/boinc* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Sep 30 12:00 /etc/rc6.d/K03boinc -> ../init.d/boinc*

6. ps -A -f | grep "boinc" - Verify that the boinc client daemon is actually running.

7. exit - Exit. You no longer need to be in su mode (you can skip this exit and the next su commands if you are doing the next section).

8. exit - Exit, if you plan to restart your computer, otherwise skip the next section if you are satisfied that BOINC is installed okay.

OPTIONAL CHECK, STOP THE COMPUTER, RESTART, VERIFY BOINC STARTS

If you want to verify that BOINC actually starts when your computer is turned on, exit, shutdown the computer, restart, enter the boinc user account and do a check.

1. 2. 3. 4.

[boinc@genesis ~]$ su Password: ******** [root@genesis boinc]# ps -A -f | grep "boinc" root 100 1 0 03:37 pts/1 /bin/su boinc -c /opt/BOINC/boinc boinc 101 100 0 03:37 pts/1 /opt/BOINC/boinc root 2008 2000 0 04:00 pts/1 grep --color boinc [root@genesis boinc]# exit                                            [boinc@genesis ~]$ exit

1. su - The following commands need to be done in Super User mode. You will need the su password too.

2. ps -A -f | grep "boinc" - Verify that the boinc client daemon is actually running.

3. exit - Exit. You no longer need to be in su mode.

4. exit - Exit.

TIME TO ADD PROJECTS FOR BOINC TO WORK ON

If you have done the previous steps and encountered no problems, then at this point, you know that the BOINC client program daemon is working fine and will start as soon as your computer is turned on. You do not need to log in and start it each time because it is automatic now. It is running as user boinc and that it is running in directory /opt/BOINC.

Time to add projects to work on because the default install has no work to do yet. Log into the BOINC user account and start the BOINC manager which you placed on the Desktop (in one of the earlier steps). Click on the Desktop boinc.sh shortcut link to launch the BOINC manager. From this point onwards (version 5.8.16 and better is easy to follow), follow the prompts and begin adding whichever projects you prefer to work on. Here is a List of BOINC Projects.

Once you are done adding all the projects you wish to work with, it is worth suggesting to you that you should set BOINC to run at 100% since there are lots of programs that may confuse BOINC into waiting for other programs to finish. The "nice" level is quite low and this low nice value makes it so almost every process on your computer will have a higher priority than BOINC and therefore BOINC should not slow down your computer for what you usually do, whether this is your computer, file server, or whatever this computer is used for. In summary, you really shouldn't notice that BOINC is running at all. If you want to check it out, use the top command to see it run (below is an example which shows an idle computer busy working at Einstein@home. You'll notice the Nice value of 19 for Einstein which allows almost every other program to have higher priority):

[boinc@genesis ~]$ top PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND           7287 boinc 34 19 62440 49m 2236 S 98.7 6.8 163:53.72 einstien_S5R3_4 3457 root 15 0 57524 16m 4192 S 0.7 2.3 4:52.38 X 3300 boinc 26 10 5060 3138 1748 S 0.3 0.4 0:18:34 boinc

Once you have finished working with the BOINC manager, exit, then log-out of the boinc user account completely since you no longer need to be here. Go back to your normal user account. Boinc is now working during idle time and will start up on boot up.

If you need to adjust anything in BOINC, just log into the boinc user account and click on the DeskTop shortcut, do what you need to do and then log out again.

Many of the steps done above could be skipped and are somewhat towards setting BOINC with group access, but BOINC is not quite yet shareable yet since this version (5.8.16) of BOINC is not quite multi-user ready yet, but it is getting very close. If you find what is needed to allow other group users to watch BOINC without affecting BOINC's operation, please send a comment. Thanks.

You are Done.

COMMENTS OR SUGGESTIONS

If you find this HowTo useful, see some errors, corrections, or improvements that can be added, please send them. Thanks.

Links To Sections Of This BOINC How To
Top Of Page	Some Suggestions	Create BOINC and Groups	Boinc At MSEC 4
Adjust HOSTS File	Download BOINC	Run And Edit	Get BOINC Daemon
Add BOINC To Init.d	Reset Computer Test	Add Projects	Comments

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