oam/knowledge base/boinc.md

BOINC

1. TL;DR
2. Client management
   1. Remote management
3. Use the GPU for computations
   1. AMD drivers
   2. Intel OpenCL support
4. Use VirtualBox for computations
5. Ask for tasks for alternative platforms
6. Gotchas
7. Further readings
   1. Sources

TL;DR

Files are located in /var/lib/boinc by default.
Some distribution (debian and derivate) use /etc/boinc-client for configuration files instead, and create links to them in the default location.

The resource share property can be set anywhere from 0 to 1000 for each project, with 0 meaning it will not get any work from that project unless every other project you run is out of work.

Setup

# Install.
flatpak install 'edu.berkeley.BOINC'
sudo apt install 'boinc-client' 'boinc-manager'     # or 'boinc-client-nvidia-cuda' or similar for more features support
sudo pacman -S 'boinc'                              # or 'boinc-nox'
sudo zypper install 'boinc-client' 'boinc-manager'

# Enable the service.
sudo systemctl start 'boinc-client.service'

# Allow GPU usage.
sudo gpasswd -a 'boinc' 'video'

Usage

# Set the GUI RPC communications port.
# Default is '31416'.
boinc --gui_rpc_port '30000'

# Open `boinc-manager` with*out* also starting the client (`-nd`).
# Connect to the instance started by the current system (`-a`).
# Allow for multiple instances of the manager (`-m`).
# Provide the connection password in the command (`-p`).
boinc-manager -nd -amp '123'

Laptop-like platforms energy management

# Do not boost the CPU frequency for niced loads.
# The governor must support it - check if the file exists.
echo 1 | sudo tee '/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/ondemand/ignore_nice_load'

# Disable (1) or enable (0) turbo boost for Intel CPUs.
echo 1 | sudo tee '/sys/devices/system/cpu/intel_pstate/no_turbo'

# Suspend computing when the computer is in use by giving the `boinc` user
# access to the X session (so that mouse and keyboard input can be communicated
# to the client).
xhost '+SI:localUser:boinc'

Client management

Name	Type
BOINC Manager	Graphical
boinccmd	Command line
boinctui	Text

Local control RPCs are authenticated using the GUI RPC password. This password is located in the gui_rpc_auth.cfg configuration file, as the single first line, with a max length of 255 characters.

A password is required from version FIXME, and is automatically generated if the file is not found or it is empty.

Resource share is used to help BOINC determine which projects to prioritize; the larger the number, the more it will prioritize work from that project over the other projects.
This value does not determine anything about how much of your CPU, GPU, etc. are used. If you want to do that, change the relative settings.
The number for resource share can be set anywhere from 0 to 1000 for each project. Setting a project's resource share to zero means it will not get any work from that project unless every other project you run is out of work.

Remote management

All remote RPCs (both status and control) are authenticated using the GUI RPC password.

Quick, dirty solution: use the --allow_remote_gui_rpc option when starting the client.
This will make the BOINC client accept connections from any host (subject to password authentication) even if the client's configuration files are set otherwise.

Better solution:

1. Add the <allow_remote_gui_rpc>1</allow_remote_gui_rpc> option to the cc_config.xml file in the BOINC data directory;

2. Restart the service to make the above change effective;

3. Check port 31416 (or the one configured for use) is reachable from other hosts.

4. Specify a set of allowed hosts creating the remote_hosts.cfg file in the BOINC data directory; its entries must be DNS host names or IP addresses, and must be one per line.

   the Read config file action in BOINC Manager's Advanced menu will also read the remote_hosts.cfg file, so a restart of the client is not required to enable changes to the remote host list.

5. Check the gui_rpc_auth.cfg file in the BOINC data directory to get the password for authentication.

Use the GPU for computations

Check the GPU is OpenCL-enabled installing and running clinfo:

$ clinfo
Number of platforms     1
  Platform Name         NVIDIA CUDA
  Platform Vendor       NVIDIA Corporation
  Platform Version      OpenCL 1.2 CUDA 10.0.132
…

If the resulting number of platform is 0, you need to install the proprietary drivers for your card.

On OpenSUSE

AMD drivers

See AMD Linux drivers and Radeon™ Software for Linux® Installation for the AMD drivers.
If you want to install also the ROCm component, see also the AMD ROCm™ documentation.

Install the amdgpu-install package from AMD's Linux drivers page, then execute it.

# Previous versions of the package (like the one in the official documentation
# at the time of writing) made DKMS fail.
sudo zypper install 'https://repo.radeon.com/amdgpu-install/22.20.3/sle/15.4/amdgpu-install-22.20.50203-1.noarch.rpm'
sudo amdgpu-install --usecase=workstation --opencl=rocr

The BOINC user also needs to be added to the video group to be able to use these drivers correctly.

gpasswd -a 'boinc' 'video'
usermod --append --groups 'video' 'boinc'

Intel OpenCL support

sudo apt install 'intel-opencl-icd' 'ocl-icd-libopencl1'
sudo pacman -Sy 'intel-compute-runtime' 'ocl-icd'
sudo zypper install 'intel-opencl' 'ocl-icd-devel'

At the next restart of the BOINC client, something similar to this line should appear in the event logs:

Oct 09 23:09:40 hostnameHere boinc[1709]: 09-Oct-2022 23:09:40 [---] OpenCL: AMD/ATI GPU 0: gfx90c:xnack- (driver version 3452.0 (HSA1.1,LC), device ve>

Use VirtualBox for computations

Install VirtualBox, then add the boinc user to the vboxusers group:

usermod --append --groups 'vboxusers' 'boinc'

Ask for tasks for alternative platforms

Required, for instance, to compute 32 bit tasks for World Community Grid's tasks on arm64 on Pi 4.
One line per platform.

See https://boinc.berkeley.edu/trac/wiki/BoincPlatforms for the available platforms.

In cc_config.xml:

<cc_config>
  <options>
    <alt_platform>arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf</alt_platform>
    <alt_platform>arm-unknown-linux-gnueabisf</alt_platform>
  </options>
</cc_config>

Gotchas

• It seems to work much better on debian-based distribution than on others.

• In order to suspend computing when the computer is in use, the boinc user should have access to your X session so that mouse and keyboard input can be communicated to the client:

  xhost '+SI:localUser:boinc'
  

Further readings

• Website
• BOINC Manager
• boinccmd for the bare CLI utility
• boinctui for a TUI manager
• GUI RPC bind to port 31416 failed: 98
• AMD ROCm™ documentation
• Check or set the CPU frequency or governor

Sources

• Client configuration
• Controlling BOINC remotely
• Installing or uninstalling the amdgpu stack
• Platforms
• Arch Wiki's BOINC page
• Linux suspend when computer is in use bug