Maybe Paul in NY downloaded BOINC + Virtual Box.

I always just download BOINC.

I upgraded as requested and it is running OK. Unfortunately, the new version added a full screen screen-saver which blocks my view of the display of stock market action. I have to wiggle the rodent every few minutes to get rid of thiks full screen advertisement. I tried renaming c:windolwsboinc.scr to c:windowsboincA.scr and so far the advertisement hasn't popped up again, but I'm not sure if the software will be continuously searching for a nonexistent file. I will remove rosetta@home if I don't get an answer to this!

Every time you install BOINC, be it an upgrade or a fresh install, the installer will change your screensaver to the BOINC one by default (you can uncheck it), which shows the graphics of whatever project you are contributing to. This is not a Rosetta thing, and Rosetta does not even have any advertisements. Go to the screensaver setting of whatever system you are running, and change it back to what you had before (presumably none).

Personally I find it a bit annoying that the BOINC installer changes your screensaver by default (at least on Windows).

Maybe next time before threatening, ask nicely first.

Arrogance runs strong these days.

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Sorry about that! Arrogance is something you acquire when you're an octogenarian who has been programming computers since the IBM 1401 and you have spent a half hour looking around in the GUI for settings which might turn off the particularly obnoxious screensaver.

Where do I find the setting which turns off the screensaver?

What about my original question ... will the absence of the wsboinc.scr file (renamed to wsboincA.scr) cause the program to waste a lot of cycles repeatedly looking for it?

By the way, I only installed BOINC the first time about two weeks ago. The original installation did not set the screensaver to appear. It only appeared after the requested update a few days ago.

Ace Casino ... I don't know what Virtual Box is. I'm running Windows 10 Pro on a standard Dell desktop. I followed the instructions in the notice that popped up a few days ago.

My guess is that you are looking in BOINC for settings. But you need to be looking in Windows. I usually right click the Windows icon (the start icon) then click search, and enter a search phrase of "change screen saver". There you will see a dropdown list. I said earlier something about setting it to "none", I see now the term is "blank" instead.

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Rosetta Moderator: Mod.Sense

Sorry about that! Arrogance is something you acquire when you're an octogenarian who has been programming computers since the IBM 1401 and you have spent a half hour looking around in the GUI for settings which might turn off the particularly obnoxious screensaver.

Where do I find the setting which turns off the screensaver?

What about my original question ... will the absence of the wsboinc.scr file (renamed to wsboincA.scr) cause the program to waste a lot of cycles repeatedly looking for it?

By the way, I only installed BOINC the first time about two weeks ago. The original installation did not set the screensaver to appear. It only appeared after the requested update a few days ago.

Disable it in your system settings (Modern displays don't even need screensavers anyways), try searching for it in the control panel, "blank" causes the screen to go black after the set time, "none" disables screensavers outright... BOINC itself does not have the settings for that. The installer is the one that installs the BOINC screensaver. After that, it is managed by the OS.
Rosetta does not have the capabilities to enable the screensaver. The Rosetta software isn't even the one that controls the screensaver. The BOINC screensaver is just BOINC calling up the graphics for Rosetta (or any other project that have graphics).

As for wsboinc.scr. That is not vital for BOINC, BOINC couldn't care less about it. It most likely won't waste cycles.

Disable it in your system settings (Modern displays don't even need screensavers anyways)

Flying toasters are still cool.

To Paul In NY:

If all the good advice theses other guys have given you isn't working why not try to uninstall BOINC and than reinstall. Maybe something became corrupt during your download?

Go to add/remove programs and get rid of BOINC.

Then Go to Rosetta home page and click on big orange box that says Join Rosetta@home.

Next page that opens will be little green box that says: Download...click it.

Next page you will see 2 boxes. The green box downloads BOINC + Virtual Box. The blue box has only BOINC. Use the Blue box that says: Download BOINC.

After clicking on Download BOINC You will have to agree to terms on 1st screen that opens. At some point it will ask if you already have an account. Click yes, and put in your username and password. Another screen will open and ask about do you want to install as service, do you want to use screen saver....either leave them unchecked or if they have a check in the box take out the check.

Once BOINC is installed you may only get 1 work unit (WU). If you return it processed correctly Rosetta will be kind enough to send you lots more.

If you want to see your WU's go to Tools at the top of BOINC Manager and click on Event Log.

If you try this...hope it helps.

I also get old URL message and a link to a site which has absolutely no info on just what to do. It would be nice for someone with a modicum of how-to knowledge to change the old URL link from the useless site to one which actually says do this & then do that. I've been running BOINC for over a decade (5 PCs now) and this is the first time that I've run into this mess.

Thanks to CIA for the help.

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CIA, thanks for the How-to, but I can not find no new tasks. Any help would be appreciated.

I wouold hope that any work submitted to "Old" URL would be useful so I'll continue until it becomes easier to "Fix" (what wasn't broke to start with).

Thanks

Put

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I guess I didn't explain about the screensaver popup sufficiently. Several of you guys have pointed me to the Windows screen saver. That is not what popped up after the Rosetta re-installation or upgrade or whatever it was that I did. I never have used the Windows screen saver.

The screensaver that popped up is definitely contained in the 958KB c:windolwsboinc.scr file. Renaming this file to boincA.scr definitely gets rid of the pop up. I can run the boinc.scr file directly from Windows and it takes over the entire screen to display large text font statistics about the running Rosetta project and nice drawings of folded proteins. It wouldn't be so obnoxious if it was in a window and could be resized or moved around, but it applies a black background to the entire screen and covers the task bar. The bottom line of large text displays a Rosetta url.

My question still stands. Since I renamed the file it no longer appears, but does the BOINC program now waste a lot of cycles looking for it repetitively? I can't find any controls in the BOINC manager to turn it off.

I guess I didn't explain about the screensaver popup sufficiently. Several of you guys have pointed me to the Windows screen saver. That is not what popped up after the Rosetta re-installation or upgrade or whatever it was that I did. I never have used the Windows screen saver.

The screensaver that popped up is definitely contained in the 958KB c:windolwsboinc.scr file. Renaming this file to boincA.scr definitely gets rid of the pop up. I can run the boinc.scr file directly from Windows and it takes over the entire screen to display large text font statistics about the running Rosetta project and nice drawings of folded proteins. It wouldn't be so obnoxious if it was in a window and could be resized or moved around, but it applies a black background to the entire screen and covers the task bar. The bottom line of large text displays a Rosetta url.

My question still stands. Since I renamed the file it no longer appears, but does the BOINC program now waste a lot of cycles looking for it repetitively? I can't find any controls in the BOINC manager to turn it off.

It IS a Windows screensaver (or, more accurately, a BOINC screensaver for Windows), what do you think the .scr extension is used for? You can install your own custom screensavers to Windows, and the BOINC installer does just that, every single time (Did I mention I find this annoying?), it installs its own screensaver (Boinc.scr), and makes it your screensaver (unless you unchecked that option in the installer). However, after installing the screensaver, the control has been handed over to Windows. To disable it you have to go to the Windows screensaver settings.
That file you renamed is BOINC's screensaver program (the .scr extension is a Windows screensaver file). BOINC will not try to find it. Windows will try to find it, but it won't waste enough cycles to matter. Renaming it causes Windows to go something like: "Oh, it's been X minutes since the last keyboard/mouse activity, time for the screensaver. Oh, it appears that the screensaver has been set to this c:windolwsboinc.scr file, but I can't find it... Well, I guess I'll not use it then."

A question related to reattaching with https:

I have 6 machines running Rosetta@home, and they also run WCG. Since reattaching to R@h manually with the https URL, my machines won't do any more WCG task, although they all have quite few waiting in line. I have resource share set to 300 for R@h, and 100 for WCG, and until now, the outcome was acceptable. I lowered R@h to 230 to see if any WCG tasks qwould kick in, but they don't.

DId anyone else experience this or something similar? Any ideas how to fix this?

CIA, thanks for the How-to, but I can not find no new tasks. Any help would be appreciated.

I wouold hope that any work submitted to "Old" URL would be useful so I'll continue until it becomes easier to "Fix" (what wasn't broke to start with).

Thanks

Put

When Boinc is open, if you aren't already using it, set it to advanced view. This is a option inside one of the menus at the top of the screen.

Once in advanced view, in the Boinc window select the "Projects" tab, this should then list any projects you are involved with.
Click on Rosetta@Home, and on the left side of the screen, click "No New Tasks". This does what it says, and Rosetta will no longer request any new work.
Click on the "Tasks" tab at the top to see your remaining work. Let those finish up, they will report back normally.
Once your queue is cleared and all reported back to the mothership, go back to the "Projects" tab and select "Rosetta@Home" again, then on the left side of the window select "Remove"
Once Rosetta@home has disappeared from your list of projects, at the top of the screen select the "Tools" pulldown menu and select "Add Project"
Scroll down to Rosetta@home, click once on it, and where it says "Project URL" at the bottom, make sure the address says HTTPS and not HTTP at the start of the URL. If it says HTTP then click on the address and add the "S" to make it say https://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/
Press next.
The next window that pops up, select "Existing user" (It defaults to new user) and log in as you would normally. Same email, same password. Everything is the same.

/Edit. I should add, after you log back in and have reattached to the new HTTPS version, you do not need to do anything else, it should start working normally from there on out. It will pull down new tasks and start crunching away. Give it a few minutes to fetch new work.

...my machines won't do any more WCG task

When the BOINC Manager first adds a new project (you just added R@h again), it takes a couple of days to get back in to balance on the work. It will watch your deadlines and schedule the work accordingly. Once it gets used to the "new" project, it will balance out to run a mix of work the way it did before.

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Rosetta Moderator: Mod.Sense

...my machines won't do any more WCG task

When the BOINC Manager first adds a new project (you just added R@h again), it takes a couple of days to get back in to balance on the work. It will watch your deadlines and schedule the work accordingly. Once it gets used to the "new" project, it will balance out to run a mix of work the way it did before.

Hi again. Thanks for the hint,but somehow, this doesn't seem to work correctly (or I'm too impatient).

I reattached R@h on Wednesday morning, May 6. I waited, as you said, until Monday morning, May 11. That's 5 complete days, where only fraction of the expected WCG tasks were done.

I then decided to set WCG to "no new tasks", while I also suspended R@h. After the WCG tasks were done, I reattached WCG this morning, May 12. Now, the behaviour is the same, only the other way round. Looks to me as if only the latest attached project is being crunched.

Was I being too impatient? Is there no way to simply let the BOINC manager let the machine do the quota of tasks I have set through the projects? In my case 70/30 R@h/WCG.

...my machines won't do any more WCG task

When the BOINC Manager first adds a new project (you just added R@h again), it takes a couple of days to get back in to balance on the work. It will watch your deadlines and schedule the work accordingly. Once it gets used to the "new" project, it will balance out to run a mix of work the way it did before.

Hi again. Thanks for the hint,but somehow, this doesn't seem to work correctly (or I'm too impatient).

I reattached R@h on Wednesday morning, May 6. I waited, as you said, until Monday morning, May 11. That's 5 complete days, where only fraction of the expected WCG tasks were done.

I then decided to set WCG to "no new tasks", while I also suspended R@h. After the WCG tasks were done, I reattached WCG this morning, May 12. Now, the behaviour is the same, only the other way round. Looks to me as if only the latest attached project is being crunched.

Was I being too impatient? Is there no way to simply let the BOINC manager let the machine do the quota of tasks I have set through the projects? In my case 70/30 R@h/WCG.

Try editing the cc_config.xml file to change :-

<rec_half_life_days>10</rec_half_life_days>

to 1 or 2

This should speed up the rate at which it learns the projects timings

You could just be more patient. BOINC responds to the deadlines in the work that it has on board. I always say people should look for resource shares to be implemented over the course of 100 hours, not 100 minutes. You basically waited 100 hours... I guess I'll have to revise my saying.

Or, as Bryn mentioned, you could modify the BOINC setting for the halflife. I just wanted to note that if you do not have a cc_config.xml file, you may have to create one. Here are the BOINC instructions on them.

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Rosetta Moderator: Mod.Sense

Was I being too impatient?

With your computes hidden it's hard to give an informed answer, but generally the slower your system the less cores & threads it has, tghe less time the sytsem is on, the less time BOINC can process work while the system is on, the the larger your cache & the more projects you run the longer it takes for your resource share settings to be honoured.
In many cases, it can take months. If you only run 2 projects with no cache all cores & threads in use, systems on 24/7 & BOIJNC able to process work 24/7 your Resource share settings will start being honoured within a few days.

Is there no way to simply let the BOINC manager let the machine do the quota of tasks I have set through the projects? In my case 70/30 R@h/WCG.

Just let it be. The more you suspend & re-enable work & tweak things, the longer it will take for things to settle down. Depending on your cache, amount of time per day your system is on, amount of time BOINC can actually process work while the system is on, number of cores/threads in use & clock speed, it could take a week or so to settle down, or a month or 2.
But it will settle down eventually if left alone.

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Grant
Darwin NT