About the scientific results page:

http://asteroidsathome.net/scientific_results.html


Can you number and date the asteroids that have been computed so that I, and everyone else, can see what we are crunching. I don't have photographic memory and right now it feels like the watts are going down a black hole.

Also, how do you determine who gets to be named next to the asteroids in the scientific results page? Is there an order and if so what are the rules?

The below idea, of a better organized scientific results page is one that I've also posted about, in different threads.

I completely agree, the minimum that should be done is to add an index in front of each computed asteroid; a date, which tells us when it has been computed and also a "Total scientific results so far" field, a number which tells us how many results we have in total.

If we want to make it even better, we should be able to find out also not just which user, but which computer has done the computation that lead to the result. It would be nice to be able to sort the scientific results by several columns (like index, date, etc.)

I also think it would be very motivational to update the scientific results page much more frequently. At least once a month, but preferably weekly.

I do understand that the project admins are busy up to their necks. I also suspect that many of them invest a lot of work in this project for free, just for doing a good deed. I respect them very much for that. I'm just trying to explain from a user's point of view that the scientific results page is very important and should be handled with higher priority.

Thanks!

I am going to improve the scientific page but it takes a time. We are really busy with other things, but this is higher priority for me to improve that. About numbering the asteroids, this won't be helpful for searching some asteroid, because every asteroid has its catalogue number there and workunits also contains their catalogue number in their name.
I don't understand why the watts are going down the black hole. Every wu which is proceesed is needed, there are results and results are public. If anyone need the data, then there its catalogue number and link to NASA page with other details about the asteroid so I don't see any waste of electricity there.
About the names, there have to be at least two results to check if the result is valid. So if there is a good model at such result than both nicknames are attached. But because each result is usually computed in another day than there would be also at least two dates at one model so I think that it would be more confusing. In that case I think that date shouldn't be there.

@ Kyong

Like I wrote before, I, and others, would like to be able to se what kind of progress we are making, because as it stands now it’s impossible. Numbering the asteroids would ended be very helpful.

If I were able to look at the science results page today and see that as of 20140609 there was, lets say, 179 asteroids and then next week I would maybe see – oops – there’s another one, because THE NUMBERED AND CHRONOLOGICALLY DATED LIST shows asteroid number 180 was listed 20140615. At the bottom of the page. Chronologically. Number 180.

Not all projects can do this, but this one can. I don’t know how much time it would take, maybe too much, but please don’t say it’s unnecessary.

I understand that this is your project and that you set the rules. I wont complain about this again.

Also, I wrote that ”it feels like the watts are going down a black hole.” I realize that they don’t. But it feels like that. Sometimes.

Ok, I see your point. I will add the index but the date must be date of publishing on the webpage because of reasons I have written. But we release results in groups if there are more results so in that case the date would be same at many models.

That’s fine. And if it where up to me you wouldn’t even have to write all the numbers in the columns under the Greek letters. Not only do they not mean anything to me, but also because the asteroids rotational characteristics can be found in DAMIT. Keep the shape column though, I like that one. : )

Thank you, Kyong, for considering our requests of improving the scientific results page. It matters a lot that you take our suggestions into consideration. I'm very thankful!

AS TBMS suggested, I think that the results should be sorted by default in the order they were computed, not ordered by the asteroid ID number. This way that index in the first column would make a lot of sense. Of course, being able to sort the table according to different columns, like this index, asteroid ID, asteroid name (alphabetically), etc, would be even better, but that's probably a lot more work and could be postponed for the future. That index is a lot more important now.

"we release results in groups if there are more results so in that case the date would be same at many models" - I don't think that's a problem. Just name this date column "Date of publishing" or something like that and it will be fine.

Please also don't forget to add a short summary to the top of the page:
- Total number of results
- Date of last update of the page

What do you think of adding one more column with links to the computers which made the computation? Perhaps it's not a good idea because the computers could be deleted after a while and the links would be broken? Well, I guess that's also true for the current links to users. Or user profiles never get deleted?

Thank you!

After more than half a year the scientific results page has not changed at all and hasn't even been updated. This is soooo disappointing!

Are you still crunching Asteroids? I left soon after and now I’m crunching World Community Grid’s different projects.

https://secure.worldcommunitygrid.org/research/viewAllProjects.do

But some of the crunchers over there also seem to share the same feeling of perceived lack of progress. Some of the busiest crunchers have given up, while some of the casuals have simply forgotten they ever signed up for this.

http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/forums/wcg/viewthread?thread=37012&offset=0

I've given up also. I will not dedicate a single FLOP to this project anymore until we get a decent scientific results page, which is regularly updated. I think it's only fair to expect this in return for our contribution.

I see now you’re not crunching anymore. I’m going in the opposite direction. I’m about to buy a used dual X5650 (6c/12t) that I’ll have on 24/7. I’m surprised to find out how cheap used workstations are on Ebay.de.

http://www.ebay.de/sch/Desktops-AllinOnePCs-/171957/i.html?_from=R40&LH_BIN=1&_nkw=2x%20x5650%2024GB&_sop=2&_clu=2&_fcid=77&_localstpos&_stpos&gbr=1

http://ark.intel.com/products/47922/Intel-Xeon-Processor-X5650-12M-Cache-2_66-GHz-6_40-GTs-Intel-QPI

They are even cheaper to buy on US Ebay, but not if one lives in a EU country that has high VAT, like I do.


Don’t let your computers idle for too long ...

Yepp, I also saw that eBay is a good place to buy used computers from.

Asteroids@Home is the project that I believe in most and it's the one that I'd really be willing to crunch for. But seeing that after almost a year the project admins still haven't updated our results (even though we have requested this a very long time ago), just demotivates me. Sure, they are busy, they always are. But this is something they should treat with high priority. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only user they've lost because of this.

Actually, as far as I’m aware it’s only been us two that have complained. Maybe other crunchers don’t care that much?

Maybe they don't care so much, maybe they haven't seen this thread, maybe they don't even care to complain :) I don't know, good question.

Maybe they don't care so much, maybe they haven't seen this thread, maybe they don't even care to complain :) I don't know, good question.

Studies have shown that only about 10% of crunchers EVER look at the message boards, there could be ALOT of people unhappy but only a few complaining about it.

I do know that Kyong is not a one man team here, but the rest only help occasionally by comparison, so he may just not have the time to get to it. A few months ago the whole project was having problems at the VERY same time he was having some SERIOUS personal problems too, none of the other Admins could do the required fixes.

We can't expect Kyong to do everything. He's only one person and he does this out of human kindness and he also has his own personal life. On the other hand you can't expect enthusiasm from the crunchers if you don't update their results. So maybe it's time to get more people involved as admins... but that requires funding... and funding requires more enthusiasts.. but you break enthusiasm by not updating the results... so it's a "devil's circle", as we call it in my language.

On the other hand you can't expect enthusiasm from the crunchers if you don't update their results.

I totally agree with you !

Under TOP COMPUTERS, I am consistently in the top 3! I would also like to see the fruits of my labor, please and thank you.

Any news about this topic?

There will be soon new results. They are prepared, just it a few days.