1) How does one actually exit a BOINC program, without losing part of the computation? Does 'suspend' in the file menu do the job? After all, one has occasionally to shut down or restart one's computer.
2) I am told that there is a periodic dump of data to the disk. On a very long run it might be worth backing this dump up to a CD, say weekly. How can this be done?
3) My firewall permits me to block all traffic, and I prefer to do this when not on-line, so that I am connected to the net for say only an hour a day. I suppose it's not possible for the program to detect when the computer is on-line, or allow the user to specify when to upload?

---

Hi William, welcome to the project.

1) Yes. Suspend, then exit. And wait until it HAS stopped before powering off.
Windows is not good at shutting down the cp processes, and then BOINC, in a graceful manner.

2) The default is 60 seconds, (a couple of seconds), with extra, (several minutes), at phase change,
(33%, & 66%, or after trickles 24 & 48). And a LOT of disk activity when the model is finished, as large numbers
of files are zipped.
I think most people who backup during the run do so to another drive. Just suspend, then copy / paste.
Suspending is necessary because some files are locked while it's running.

3)There is an option in File to 'Disable BOINC network access'. This allows YOU to decide when
to upload the trickles. This is how I control mine.

Les

Re 1:
Suspend will do the job of avoiding loosing work if a) you have set keep in memory while suspended to yes, and b) you do not actually turn off the computer.

If you are going to turn off the computer then AFAIK there is no way of avoiding loosing work other than watching visualisation until a checkpoint is passed (watch for start of 1/4/7/10 etc of month) then suspend and exit BOINC.
The work is saved every 144 timesteps (3 model days) and I do not think that the save to disk every 60 seconds preference changes anything.

---

Visit BOINC WIKI for help

And join BOINC Synergy for all the news in one place.

>...I do not think that the save to disk every 60 seconds preference changes >anything.

It sets a minimum time between checkpoints. Since CPDN goes so long between checkpoints anyway it doesn't really affect anything here. At a project like seti that can possibly checkpoint every 10 seconds or less it will make a difference.

---

BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8