Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing
The Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing ( BOINC short ) is a software platform for distributed computing.
The BOINC platform is being developed at the University of Berkeley and makes it possible to make the unused computing power of thousands of computers over the Internet or intranet. This takes the form of projects working mostly non-profit and are managed by universities or other institutions. The currently most computationally intensive projects include calculations for generating an accurate 3D model of the Milky Way, the search for extraterrestrial life, calculation of gravitational waves, predictions of climate change, as well as the simulation of protein folding for research into new drugs.
- 4.1 Safety of the client
- 4.2 Safety of the project
Details
In developing BOINC experiences of the distributed computing project SETI @ home were used. The main aim of the platform is the separation of project management of the scientific content.
Users of this platform to install a client program and can thus distribute their free computing time on one or more projects. This represents an important improvement over clients to only one project -bound, as some distributed computing projects do not have enough work to provide a great user base is sufficient. SETI @ home classic circumvented this problem by some work packages were issued up to twelve times to calculate, although to secure accurate scientifically usable Results only three results would be necessary. With a participating in several projects BOINC client the available computing power can thus be used more effectively.
Since November 18, 2003 BOINC is licensed under the GNU General Public License. The aim of the release of the program code is an even broader platform support, through active assistance of the free software community, and increased security.
Since version 6.4.5, the CUDA technology is supported by Nvidia. This makes it possible to exploit the computing power of graphics cards manufacturer with CUDA support. Since version 6.10.x the ATI Stream technology is supported, which, similar to CUDA, the computation on graphics card manufacturer ATI Technologies allowed.
Currently (March 2013), the platform at about 400,000 active computers computing power of an average of 9 petaflops, which varies depending on the day. By supporting the calculation of work packages with a compatible graphics card, the processing power has increased in the past.
Components
On the user side
In older versions of the core client is integrated in both the graphical BOINC Manager, as well as the command line interface. In current versions of the separate core client via shared memory to communicate with the control programs.
On the server side
The provided on the project backend is based on a web server, PHP as a scripting language and a MySQL database. For large projects, back-end services can be distributed across multiple servers. Some projects use Perl or ASP instead of PHP for the backend, these are in-house developments of the projects that mimic the default Berkeley communication protocol.
Functions
The behavior of the BOINC framework can be adapted to the needs of different projects. Among the functions that are only used by some projects include:
Security
Safety of the client
The BOINC client can be configured so that a so-called Protected Mode will be used. The BOINC instance is running in a sandbox mode. For this purpose, a equipped with low-rights user account is used.
Safety of the project
Theoretically, it is possible that the donated by the users computing time for the projects is misused, used for example for illegal actions. Therefore, the project operator agree to publish the project results in each case. The source code of the project applications is partially released so that a malicious function can be detected. No case has been known to do so.
Credits
For successfully calculated and reported back within the validity of so-called work packages credits are awarded. These virtual points allow the comparison of invested computation times between the participants and the teams. The amount of the credit can be given to one of the project (fixed credits) or to another based on the calculation time and the speed of the computer calculated to be determined.
Projects
On the computer, only the BOINC software must be installed. After registering at one or more of the projects BOINC charges independently the project software required down and does the actual computing process. Meanwhile, a wide range of projects available to be continuously developed new.