elfece
01-02-2008, 03:36 PM
The B.O.I.N.C (Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing) is a plataform developed at the university of Bekerley that aims to create a volunteer-based distributed network for supercomputing.
The average computer, when it's ON, it's almost idle most of the time, so what BOINC does is put on good propose all that processing power that otherwise would be wasted.
Once BOINC is installed, you can subscribe to several projects (on their webs, BOINC also has a wizard to do that) and participate: You will receive packets of data for your computer to process (you can configure it to do it while on screensaver, at certain time, all the time... as well as set the amount of CPU cycles that BOINC is able to 'eat up'), and when your computer ends processing the data (it usually takes a few hours, depending of the data and your processor) it sends the results back. This way, you are participating in a 'supercomputer' and helping to do some very interesting and helpful things.
(More info on BOINC here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), BOINC official webpage here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)).
Maybe the most well known of the BOINC projects (the original one, who led to the develoment of BOINC) is SETI@home (SETI stands from Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence).
SETI@home uses the BOINC plataform to process data coming from the Arecibo radio telescope (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), trying to find any signal that could suggest an extra-terrestrial intelligent origin.
(More info on SETI@home here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), SETI@home official page here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.); also, for the i-want-to-believe ones, here's (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.!_signal) some interesting info about a little signal caught 31 years ago and could come from extra-terrestrial beings... the truth is out there :rolleyes:)
For those who are more into terrestrial concerns, there are also many projects involved into proteine folding and assembly simulation, which can give valuable information to fight against cancer, AIDS, malaria, Alzheimer and many other diseases.
There are also various projects aimed to find solution to many mathematical problems and cryptology, as well as investigation on physical and astronomical research, and many more).
Additionally, on 2004 was born the World Community Grid, an attemp to create the biggest volunteer computing grid which can be used on various projects as it's needed.
(More information on World Community Grid here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), WCG official webpage here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.))
Here's (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) a list of the BOINC projects.
You can join to as many projects as you want, but I would specially recommend joining the World Community Grid, as I think it is better to join all our efforts into one multi-propose project that could end up being the fastest supercomputer on the earth.
BOINC is free software, and the information obtained by us is not sold to any private company, but used 'in benefit of humanity'.
There are BOINC versions for Windows, Linux, FreeBSD and MacOS, both for 32 and 64 bits processors.
So why don't you give some of the unused power of your computer and contribute to make this world a better place, or just participate into something that interests you? :thumbsup:
The average computer, when it's ON, it's almost idle most of the time, so what BOINC does is put on good propose all that processing power that otherwise would be wasted.
Once BOINC is installed, you can subscribe to several projects (on their webs, BOINC also has a wizard to do that) and participate: You will receive packets of data for your computer to process (you can configure it to do it while on screensaver, at certain time, all the time... as well as set the amount of CPU cycles that BOINC is able to 'eat up'), and when your computer ends processing the data (it usually takes a few hours, depending of the data and your processor) it sends the results back. This way, you are participating in a 'supercomputer' and helping to do some very interesting and helpful things.
(More info on BOINC here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), BOINC official webpage here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)).
Maybe the most well known of the BOINC projects (the original one, who led to the develoment of BOINC) is SETI@home (SETI stands from Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence).
SETI@home uses the BOINC plataform to process data coming from the Arecibo radio telescope (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), trying to find any signal that could suggest an extra-terrestrial intelligent origin.
(More info on SETI@home here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), SETI@home official page here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.); also, for the i-want-to-believe ones, here's (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.!_signal) some interesting info about a little signal caught 31 years ago and could come from extra-terrestrial beings... the truth is out there :rolleyes:)
For those who are more into terrestrial concerns, there are also many projects involved into proteine folding and assembly simulation, which can give valuable information to fight against cancer, AIDS, malaria, Alzheimer and many other diseases.
There are also various projects aimed to find solution to many mathematical problems and cryptology, as well as investigation on physical and astronomical research, and many more).
Additionally, on 2004 was born the World Community Grid, an attemp to create the biggest volunteer computing grid which can be used on various projects as it's needed.
(More information on World Community Grid here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), WCG official webpage here (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.))
Here's (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) a list of the BOINC projects.
You can join to as many projects as you want, but I would specially recommend joining the World Community Grid, as I think it is better to join all our efforts into one multi-propose project that could end up being the fastest supercomputer on the earth.
BOINC is free software, and the information obtained by us is not sold to any private company, but used 'in benefit of humanity'.
There are BOINC versions for Windows, Linux, FreeBSD and MacOS, both for 32 and 64 bits processors.
So why don't you give some of the unused power of your computer and contribute to make this world a better place, or just participate into something that interests you? :thumbsup: