Hi!

So first of all I enjoy playing around with computers a lot so I often try different Hardware and also OSes.
When playing around with FreeBSD I also wanted to run BOINC with it.

I soon realized, that Asteroids@home was only project I could find with native FreeBSD support and since I was contributing to it already anyways, I wanted to give it a go.

So on to the issue.
I noticed that for some batches of tasks I get the infamous error:

Error: Number of lc points is greater than POINTS_MAX = 1000

(e.g in https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/result.php?resultid=434241494 or https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/result.php?resultid=408822693)

When looking through the forums I found that this occurred any platform at some point in the past because it is related to the way the WUs are generated nowadays and to fix this an newer version of the app version is needed.
(see e.g. thread https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/forum_thread.php?id=788)

The app list shows that the FreeBSD app is indeed the oldest one around: 100.00 (over 10 years old!).
(https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/apps.php)


There are two things here that would be awesome to see:

1. Update of the the app to a more recent version

and the second one is a sneaky feature request:

2. If possible also provide SIMD versions of the app.

The hosts I used for this are based on Sandy Bridge, Skylake and Coffee Lake.
So not using AVX/AVX2 or even SSE3 really increases the CPU time needed per task by a lot...

My hope here is that this basically comes down to just reusing the Linux codebase, maybe rebuilding it for FreeBSD and not too much actual coding efforts...

Even then I do realize that developer time is precious and should probably be spend on more useful things and not on a platform with probably something like 3 users and a contribution percentage about the same as the Windows Vista hosts ;-)

So if there are no plans to address this because there is not enough dev time available I can understand that too.

Thanks
gnalord

Well, you're right that every task needs time.
I'll try to find some and build sse3, avx & fma versions along with updated version of the no optimization application.

Cheers!

---

“The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

Gi gnalord,

We just released the latest builds of the FreeBDS x86_64 Period search applications. You can give them a try.
Unfortunately we found out that BOINC's client for FreeBDS does not report 'fma' and 'avx512dq' processor features back to the server. So until and if this is going to be fixed by the BOINC's team your client will be able to execute only the no optimized CPU and the SSE3 applications. Or you can switch to 'Anonymus platform' where you can take advantage of the AVX, FMA or AVX512 SIMD optimized versions.

Best,
Georgi

---

“The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

Hi Georgi,

Thanks for the update!

I just tried it on 2 machines and unfortunately I am not getting any tasks at all now:

Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | cc_config.xml not found - using defaults
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Starting BOINC client version 7.20.2 for x86_64-pc-freebsd
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | This a development version of BOINC and may not function properly
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Libraries: libcurl/8.5.0 OpenSSL/3.0.12 zlib/1.3 libpsl/0.21.2 (+libidn2/2.3.4) libssh2/1.11.0 nghttp2/1.58.0
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Data directory: /var/db/boinc
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | No usable GPUs found
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Host name: salome
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Processor: 4  Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-6100T CPU @ 3.20GHz [Family 6 Model 94 Stepping 3]
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Processor features: sse sse2 pni mmx avx
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | OS: FreeBSD: 14.0-RELEASE-p3
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Memory: 7.85 GB physical, 0 bytes virtual
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Disk: 103.28 GB total, 97.58 GB free
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Local time is UTC +1 hours
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Config: GUI RPCs allowed from:
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | akirose
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | 192.168.4.142
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 | Asteroids@home | General prefs: from Asteroids@home (last modified 26-Aug-2023 19:13:26)
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 | Asteroids@home | Host location: none
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 | Asteroids@home | General prefs: using your defaults
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Reading preferences override file
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Preferences:
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | max memory usage when active: 4020.79 MB
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | max memory usage when idle: 7237.42 MB
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | max disk usage: 32.00 GB
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | max CPUs used: 3
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | suspend work if non-BOINC CPU load exceeds 25%
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Setting up project and slot directories
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Checking active tasks
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 | Asteroids@home | URL https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/; Computer ID 762985; resource share 100
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Setting up GUI RPC socket
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Can't resolve hostname in remote_hosts.cfg: akirose
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 |  | Checking presence of 0 project files
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 | Asteroids@home | Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Sun Jan 28 01:24:11 2024 | Asteroids@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun Jan 28 01:24:13 2024 | Asteroids@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun Jan 28 01:24:13 2024 | Asteroids@home | No tasks sent
Sun Jan 28 01:24:13 2024 | Asteroids@home | Project requested delay of 7 seconds
Sun Jan 28 01:31:42 2024 | Asteroids@home | Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Sun Jan 28 01:31:42 2024 | Asteroids@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun Jan 28 01:31:44 2024 | Asteroids@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun Jan 28 01:31:44 2024 | Asteroids@home | No tasks sent
Sun Jan 28 01:31:44 2024 | Asteroids@home | Project requested delay of 7 seconds
(from https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/show_host_detail.php?hostid=762985)

Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | cc_config.xml not found - using defaults
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Starting BOINC client version 7.20.2 for x86_64-pc-freebsd
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | This a development version of BOINC and may not function properly
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Libraries: libcurl/8.5.0 OpenSSL/1.1.1t zlib/1.2.13 libpsl/0.21.2 (+libidn2/2.3.4) libssh2/1.11.0 nghttp2/1.58.0
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Data directory: /var/db/boinc
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | No usable GPUs found
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Host name: MrTestSr
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Processor: 4  Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-2520M CPU @ 2.50GHz [Family 6 Model 42 Stepping 7]
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Processor features: sse sse2 pni mmx avx
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | OS: FreeBSD: 13.2-RELEASE
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Memory: 7.84 GB physical, 0 bytes virtual
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Disk: 54.46 GB total, 50.91 GB free
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Local time is UTC +1 hours
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Config: GUI RPCs allowed from:
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | akirose
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 | Asteroids@home | General prefs: from Asteroids@home (last modified 26-Aug-2023 19:13:26)
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 | Asteroids@home | Host location: none
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 | Asteroids@home | General prefs: using your defaults
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Preferences:
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | max memory usage when active: 4016.59 MB
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | max memory usage when idle: 7229.87 MB
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | max disk usage: 32.00 GB
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | suspend work if non-BOINC CPU load exceeds 25%
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Setting up project and slot directories
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Checking active tasks
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 | Asteroids@home | URL https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/; Computer ID 763662; resource share 100
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Setting up GUI RPC socket
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 |  | Checking presence of 0 project files
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 | Asteroids@home | Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Sun Jan 28 02:10:29 2024 | Asteroids@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun Jan 28 02:10:31 2024 | Asteroids@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun Jan 28 02:10:31 2024 | Asteroids@home | No tasks sent
Sun Jan 28 02:10:31 2024 | Asteroids@home | Project requested delay of 7 seconds
Sun Jan 28 02:23:14 2024 | Asteroids@home | Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Sun Jan 28 02:23:14 2024 | Asteroids@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun Jan 28 02:23:15 2024 | Asteroids@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun Jan 28 02:23:15 2024 | Asteroids@home | No tasks sent
Sun Jan 28 02:23:15 2024 | Asteroids@home | Project requested delay of 7 seconds
Sun Jan 28 02:51:40 2024 | Asteroids@home | update requested by user
Sun Jan 28 02:51:42 2024 | Asteroids@home | Sending scheduler request: Requested by user.
Sun Jan 28 02:51:42 2024 | Asteroids@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun Jan 28 02:51:43 2024 | Asteroids@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun Jan 28 02:51:43 2024 | Asteroids@home | No tasks sent
Sun Jan 28 02:51:43 2024 | Asteroids@home | Project requested delay of 7 seconds
(from https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/show_host_detail.php?hostid=763662)

I don't see anything off in the logs, so I assume there is still something missing on the server side?

About the CPU feature issue:
Is there anything I can do to help with that (e.g. raising a ticket somewhere) or did you already contact the right people?

I have heard about the 'Anonymous platform' and I will probably look into it at some point in time. But right now I'd like to run it the normal way first.

Thanks
gnalord

Hi gnalord,

Thanks for pointing that out to us!
We'll double check what could be went wrong.


Best,
Georgi

---

“The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

Hi gnalord,

We managed to figure it out what was wrong with the settings so, now server just started to send work to the FreeBSD clients.

Feel free to share any additional info or issues if you find any.

Best,
Georgi

---

“The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

Hi Georgi,

Yes, I can confirm that it is working now.
I am getting tasks now, the optimized apps work and the original issue of the MAX_POINTS errors is fixed.
From my end all the things I really care about are resolved and I can go back to crunching.
Thank you for solving the issue.

Some additional notes and things I tried:

#1: I did some napkin math for 2 machines and the improvements are amazing even for the non-optimized app!
Machine 1:

Period Search Application v100.00 x86_64-pc-freebsd: CPU time ~50k/~14h (baseline)
Period Search Application v102.15 (freebsd_1302) x86_64-pc-freebsd: CPU time ~27k/~7h40m (~1.8x as fast as before)
Period Search Application v102.15 (sse3_freebsd_1302) X86_64-pc-freebsd: CPU time ~12k/3h20m (~4.2x as fast as before)
(no AVX support on this machine)

Machine 2:

Period Search Application v100.00 x86_64-pc-freebsd: CPU time ~30k/~8h20m (baseline)
Period Search Application v102.15 (avx_freebsd_1302)X86_64-pc-freebsd: CPU time ~4k/~1h10m (~7.3x as fast as before!)

This level of improvement makes the platform way more usable and I am very happy with this. Great job!


#2: To double check I tried using a Tiger Lake machine (supports FMA and AVX512) and can confirm via the event log that only features up to AVX are detected.

#3: I initially feared that the apps would only get send to and work on FreeBSD 13.2 machines as they are named xxx_freebsd_1302. But I am having no issues receiving and crunching tasks on a FreeBSD 14.0 machine so that is good.

Thanks
gnalord