Not receiving tasks

Dr.Wayne
Dr.Wayne
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Topic 223971

My computers appear to have completed their work units but are no longer receiving new tasks. I made no changes myself. I've tried deleting and reinstalling the BOINC app, without results. Is the system down?

archae86
archae86
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If you look around the forums

If you look around the forums here just a very little, you'll notice that more than one person with a similar question in the last few days has found that enabling the use of test applications in the BETA SETTINGS portion of the project preferences was needed.

Aside from looking around the forums, the very first thing you should have done is to review the last contact log for each of your machines.

Had you done so, possibly you might have spotted this line:

"beta test app versions not allowed in project prefs."

which is an additional hint.

I'll refrain from repeating the further explanations readily available in the other threads on this topic.

Good luck, and I hope this fixes the problem in your case.

 

 

Gary Roberts
Gary Roberts
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Wayne D Rosenfield PhD

Wayne D Rosenfield PhD wrote:
My computers appear to have completed their work units but are no longer receiving new tasks.

This problem has been discussed in this thread in the 'Problems and Bug Reports' section of the forum.  The workaround for the problem is given there.  In particular, look for answers given by Richie.

As a general rule, the Problems board is the proper place to look for information or report issues of this nature.

It really shouldn't be necessary to resort to enabling 'Test Apps' just to keep working, so hopefully the Staff will correct this oversight at some point soon.  Expect to see some sort of announcement in the Technical News thread that first announced the new test app that is causing the problem.  Unless you are paying close attention and are willing to experience failures when test apps are first released, it's probably not desirable to enable the test apps preference on a long term basis, though.  Once this gets sorted, you may wish to disable test apps once again.

Cheers,
Gary.

Dr.Wayne
Dr.Wayne
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The best reply would have

The best reply would have said this:

"Be certain that you are looking at the web-based settings and not the app on a local machine."

Problem solved. Thanks anyway.

Dr. Wayne

archae86
archae86
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For people who might find

For people who might find their way to this thread:

Bernd has posted to a Problems and Bug Reports thread on this topic advising that as of now the new work in question is being no longer sent out with Beta Test categorization.

So for the time being this particular reason for people not getting work does not apply.

Gary Roberts
Gary Roberts
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ד"ר וויין wrote: The best

ד"ר וויין wrote:

The best reply would have said this:

"Be certain that you are looking at the web-based settings and not the app on a local machine."

You yourself stated, "I made no changes myself."

If you were receiving tasks and then that suddenly stopped without you changing anything, why would it be beneficial to change any settings at all - website or local??  Your suggested "best reply" makes no sense at all.

The reason for the problem was clearly pointed out to you.  I also took the trouble to advise the staff of the problem by drawing their attention to that same thread in the Problems section that I pointed out to you.  As a result, Bernd took immediate action to solve the problem by promoting the test app to be the default app.

Yes, it was a case of "Problem solved."  But not by any website preference setting you might have changed.

Cheers,
Gary.

VE7DOG
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work around, doesn't work for

work around, doesn't work for me, the lack of the team acknowledging the issue, that several people seem to be having doesn't help. I changed my preferences to allow Beta and I get new tasks but they're all come out as computation errors. So basically that's the end of Einstein@Home for me. I'll move on to something other or I'll probably just stop using BOINC screensavers. 

 

Gary Roberts
Gary Roberts
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Hi VE7DOG,  welcome to

Hi VE7DOG,  welcome to Einstein@Home.

VE7DOG wrote:
work around, doesn't work for me,

It would help if you gave more information about what it is that isn't working for you.  Your computers are 'hidden' which means that people willing to help are unable to check what the problem actually is.  It's fine to not allow others to 'see' those non-sensitive details but that means you have to check through the data returned to the project yourself or provide a link to an example computation error so others can check for you.

VE7DOG wrote:
the lack of the team acknowledging the issue, that several people seem to be having doesn't help.

The new version of the app was announced in Technical News.  If you look at that announcement, you will see examples of error reports and also responses from 'team' (which is just Bernd).  Wouldn't it make more sense to post a proper report there, a place where 'team' will be looking for any indications of problems?  The "Cafe" is intended for socialising, not problem reports.  Do you really expect busy staff to be constantly monitoring the Cafe?

VE7DOG wrote:
I changed my preferences to allow Beta and I get new tasks but they're all come out as computation errors.

As I understand it, the only part of the app that was changed was to do with the screensaver - which isn't supposed to have any involvement with the scientific computation.  As a result, it's probably more likely to be something else causing your problem.  If you provide a link to the host in question or to one of the failed tasks, it would be very simple to check for the actual cause of the problem.  If you respond with that information, I will check it for you.

A lot of the problems with getting new work seemed to be coming from people with Macs.  Is your computer one of those?

Cheers,
Gary.

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