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Points |
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- When are points and statistics updated?
- Team Points and Personal Points Distribution
- Why are points not updated even though new work
units have been downloaded?
- Will I lose points if a work unit finishes slower
than usual?
- What are points?
- How are points used?
- Points on agent and web are different
- How is my connection speed determined in relation
to the comparison device?
- How are points calculated?
- I have completed a result, but I have not yet
received credit for it. What is going on?
- What is validation?
- How are points calculated for the Linux agent?
- Why does my Linux agent show different points
then the web site?
When are points and
statistics updated?
World Community Grid points and
statistics are updated four times a day. This occurs at 00:00,
06:00, 12:00 and 18:00 UTC. This includes all statistics on World
Community Grid except for Team Statistics.
Team Statistics are updated once a day at 00:00 UTC.
Team Points and Personal
Points Distribution
Points that you earn are only credited
to a team if they are earned while you are a member of that team.
Additionally, if you quit a team or a join another team, then the
points that you earned for your previous team will stay with that
team. You can transfer credit you previously earned to a new team.
Any points you earn whether you are on a team or not will always
show up under your personal statistics.
You can view the points that you have earned for different teams
at the bottom of your My
Grid page.
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Why are points not
updated even though new work units have been downloaded?
Several situations can cause this to
happen:
- Problems experienced during the transmission of results may
cause the return to be discarded. This is very rare. If you
are consistently not getting points, this probably doesn't
apply to you-its probably one of the issues below.
- Check to see if your number of work units returned is
incrementing. If it is, you may have a bug in which the
software works for long periods of time, but only reports a
very low run time on task. This is very infrequent. If your
number is not incrementing, you have a different issue.
- Sometimes a computer hiccup causes the software to abandon
the work unit. This may not be noticeable if you leave the
software running in the background with unrestricted access to
the internet, in which case it may appear that the software
completed the work unit and downloaded a new one when it did
not. It would also account for recent reports/posts where
members notice that the software only gets x percentage done
then logs in and downloads a new work unit.
If you systematically do not receive points but are constantly
downloading new work unit, please check the software's directory
for legacy work unit files. The default directory is c:\program
files\world community grid, and the work unit files are ud_#,
where the # is replaced by a series of one or more numbers. There
is no extension, and the icon should be the windows symbol because
they are not associated with any application. Doing a clean
install of the software should alleviate this problem. To do a
clean install of the software, please do the following:
- Close the software by minimizing the window if it is open,
then right clicking on its icon in the system tray and
clicking on Exit.
- Uninstall the software from [Start][Settings][Control
Panel][Add/Remove Programs].
- Check to ensure that the software's directory (by default
c:\program files\world community grid) has been deleted. If it
is not, delete it and all files.
- If you have your original install file, delete it.
- If you performed any of the above manual deletions, empty
the recycle bin.
- Install the latest service pack updates from
Microsoft.
- Download a new copy of the software.
- Restart your machine.
- Install the software from the newly downloaded file. Restart
the computer.
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Will I lose points if a
work unit finishes slower than usual?
No. Points are not tied to number of
work units, but amount of computational effort exerted. Therefore,
if your computer worked for three days on one work unit, or in
those same three days completed five work units, you would get the
same amount of points if the machine worked at the same level of
effort.
What are points?
Your PC contribution is shown in three
measures-points, total run time and results returned. The term
points is simply used as a way of measuring the amount of
computation your PC has contributed. If your PC works for three
days on one work unit, or in those same three days completes 5
work units, you will accumulate the same number of points assuming
that your PC worked at about the same level of effort in each
scenario.
How are points used?
The calculation of Points is the method
World Community Grid uses to measure your contribution to
individual research projects running on World Community Grid.
Points are used for competitive comparison on the stats pages.
Points on agent and web
are different
World Community Grid is running two
types of agents. The Windows agent and the Linux agent. The points
displayed in each agent only include the points earned by that
type of agent. The website will display the total points earned by
both types of agents.
How is my connection
speed determined in relation to the comparison device?
For the comparison, the software
measures your network connection speed to the World Community Grid
servers.
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How are points
calculated?
Points are calculated and awarded each
time a work unit is completed and a result is successfully
returned to World Community Grid Servers. Points are totaled
across all machines aggregated under a specific World Community
Grid Member.
Points are based upon the strength of your machine(s), measured
against World Community Grid Comparison Device. First, the
strength of your participating machine(s) is calculated by
measuring the following parameters of your machine against World
Community Grid Comparison Device:
- CPU Power: The software periodically runs
diagnostic tests to establish the processing power of your
hardware configuration. These values are averaged and then
divided by the CPU-Power value of World Community Grid
Comparison Device. The averaged value is then multiplied by
the run time used to complete the work unit and return the
results to World Community Grid Servers.
- Random Access Memory (RAM): The software
recognizes the amount of RAM in your hardware configuration.
Each time the software starts, it detects any changes to the
amount of installed RAM. This value is divided by the RAM
value of World Community Grid Comparison Device. The result of
this calculation is then multiplied by the run time used to
complete the work unit and return the results to World
Community Grid Servers.
- Hard Disk Storage: On your preferences
page, you set the megabytes of hard disk space allocated and
available to World Community Grid projects. The lesser of the
amount of hard drive space allocated and the amount of total
space available on your hard drive partition, is divided by
the Hard Disk Storage value of World Community Grid Comparison
Device. The result of this calculation is then multiplied by
the run time used to complete the work unit and return the
results to World Community Grid Servers.
- Effective Upstream Throughput: The software
runs a diagnostic test on a regular basis that measures the
upstream throughput of your hardware configuration, when
communicating with World Community Grid Servers. These values
are averaged, and the result is divided by the Effective
Upstream Throughput value of World Community Grid Comparison
Device. The result of this calculation is then multiplied by
the run time used to complete the work unit and return the
results to World Community Grid Servers.
The final values for all four parameters are weighted, totaled,
and factored to generate a whole number of points greater than or
equal to 1 for each result returned. While any individual
parameter can overachieve the corresponding parameter for World
Community Grid Comparison Device by any level, no work unit
completed by any machine will earn more than twice the total
number of points World Community Grid Comparison Device would earn
for that same work unit. Note: The slightest variance in any of
the five parameters coupled with the inherent differences across
multiple applications and work units within one project will
result in different point values being assigned per work unit
completion.
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I have completed a
result, but I have not yet received credit for it. What is going
on?
BOINC does not award credit to users
until the work they have performed has been successfully
validated. This means that users may experience a delay in being
granted credit while BOINC waits for enough results to be returned
in order to perform validation.
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What is validation?
World Community Grid is a public
distributed computing project. This means that work is being sent
to computers that are outside the control of World Community Grid.
Most computers that perform this work are reliable. However, there
are a few computers that are not reliable due to things such as
users over-clocking their machines, memory errors, disk errors,
CPU errors or viruses being present on the machine. This means
that the results returned need to be validated to make sure that
they represent the correct answer. We have configured BOINC so
that the results from at least four computers calculate the same
result before it is accepted as the correct result. This ensures
the integrity of the data returned to the scientists.
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How are points
calculated for the Linux agent?
The Linux agent is using BOINC. BOINC
points are calculated in a two-step process. First, the points
(also called credit) claimed by a host are determined. BOINC
points are calculated based on a benchmark that is run
periodically by the BOINC client. This benchmark is then run
through a calculation that determines how much credit per second
of run time that device should earn. More information about that
formula is available at the following sites: http://boinc.berkeley.edu/credit.php
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BOINC_Credit_System#Cobblestones
Second, once validation has been completed, BOINC gives the same
credit for a result to every device that worked on the same work
unit. BOINC calculates how much credit this should be by taking
the claimed credit for each result that was determined to be
valid, eliminating the low and high values and then averaging the
rest.
This process eliminates the ability for malicious users to
artificially claim higher points for their work.
Why does my Linux agent
show different points then the web site?
The Linux agent, which is using BOINC,
and the Windows agent, which is using the UD software, compute
points differently. In particular, BOINC points are much lower
then UD points. As a result, World Community Grid multiplies the
points granted to a user for a result by 7 when the statistics are
imported into World Community Grid’s web site. The BOINC client
is not aware of this multiplication, and it thus reports the
points that were granted by BOINC.
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