I upgraded my BOINC client from 5.4.9 to 5.8.17 on my
dual G4 running OS X 10.3.9 Panther Server. Since then
every work unit has failed with a signal 5 error. Once
I noticed the problem (when daily WU quota went to 1!)
I reinstalled 5.4.9 and the problem seems to have gone
away. Here's the full error text:

<core_client_version>5.8.17</core_client_version>
<![CDATA[
<message>
process got signal 5
</message>
<stderr_txt>
dyld: rosetta_5.62_powerpc-apple-darwin Undefined symbols:
rosetta_5.62_powerpc-apple-darwin undefined reference to ___cxa_atexit expected to be defined in /usr/lib/libSystem.B.dylib

</stderr_txt>
]]>

I am running 5.8.17 perfectly OK under OS X 10.4.9 on
a single CPU G4 PowerBook and on a twin G5 system, so
it would appear that this is an OS X 10.3 Panther
issue.

Is this a known problem?

There were some problems with some older PowerPC Macs in the 5.62 release and the new version of the BOINC functions that were incorporated in to it. The 5.64 release seems to have resolved these problems, and indeed it looks like your are now returning good results.

The max WUs per day is reduced when erroneous results are returned. Your machine ran through 100+ tasks with all the errors. You've now returned two valid results and with each valid result returned your maximum is doubled. So it presently shows 4 per day. Now that the problem is corrected, this will all take care of itself, you will be back to the normal max of 100 per day very soon.

So I think your problems were due to the change in Rosetta release, not the change in the release of BOINC that you installed. You might want to crunch a few days, to further confirm you are running error free, and then try the new BOINC version if you like.

Sorry for the problems. The project team worked all weekend to locate and correct the problem. That was why 5.64 came out Sunday night.

---

Rosetta Moderator: Mod.Sense

Many thanks for your prompt response, and your confirmation of the 5.62 release
of the Rosetta client being the problem. I finally noticed that correlation too.

I'll let this Mac server go on crunching as it is until SETI starts issuing new
work units, then I can have a comparison when I re-upgrade the BOINC client.

Again, many thanks for your response.