Hi, last night Boinc was running along nicely, when I got up this morning every page of the account manager was blank and I was unable to do network connection or sync with Boincstats/Bam. My projects had all gone and there were no messages for me to reference what may have happened. I had to completely reboot pc to get it all back, which is fine as it did seem to hold the work that had been previously done. As I was not around when it happened there were no error messages for me to read, am just wondering if anyone can think of a reason why this may have happened. I have tried searching the forums but as I dont know what problem I am looking for I cannot really find an answer. Wondered if the more technically minded on here may have any thoughts?

That's actually a BOINC problem, not a BOINCstats/BAM! one.

The BOINC client comes in two parts: boinc.exe, which does the housekeeping (starting/stopping tasks, up/downloading) and the manager (boincmgr.exe), which is just the Graphical User Interface (GUI) to the "background" process.

Depending on your BOINC version and the count of downloaded tasks on your system, sometimes the manager disconnects from the client. That usually doesn't prevent the client from continuing to run and you can try using the Advanced menu command "Select computer..." to reconnect the manager (apart from a reboot).

If you have very many task (more than 1000) downloaded, you should consider reducing your cache of work units in your preferences (Additional work buffer).

Gruß,
Gundolf

Thank you for a prompt reply. Sorry for posting in wrong part of forum I confused Boinc Manager with Boinc Account Manager. I am using boinc version 6.10.18 and have 30 tasks downloaded, am amazed that anyone could have 1000 tasks, guess the better the machine the more work can be done. I have checked my additional work buffer as suggested and it is on ten days, do you think that is too much? It is nice to know that if the graphical interface goes wrong the work keeps running, cheers for the information, I am still learning and some people on here have been very helpful, many thanks.

30 tasks are definitely not too much, though I think a ten-day buffer is a bit heavy; but that's my personal opinion (your wing mates have to wait quite long for the validation of their tasks). Those 1000 tasks quickly pile up when there's a GPU (or multiple) used for crunching. Some projects have applications that run on either Nvidia or ATI graphic cards (Graphical Processing Units).

The symptom you described could also result from a crash of boinc.exe. You could check in task manager (for windows) if it's still running when that happens again. In that case, a "Select compter..." wouldn't work either, but a complete exit of the Manager (File menu) and a relaunch might.

But you should find at least some hints in the BOINC messages log. You can find that in the file stdoutdae.txt in the BOINC data directory (which might be hidden by windows).

Gruß,
Gundolf

ok I have reset buffer to 5 days. looked in hidden file and found this

24-Mar-2010 04:44:11 [FreeHAL@home] Started upload of fh_0_1748514_3287_0_0
24-Mar-2010 04:44:15 [FreeHAL@home] Finished upload of fh_0_1748514_3287_0_0
24-Mar-2010 04:44:33 [FreeHAL@home] Task fh_2_1748515_3264_0 exited with zero status but no 'finished' file
24-Mar-2010 04:44:33 [FreeHAL@home] If this happens repeatedly you may need to reset the project.
24-Mar-2010 04:44:33 [FreeHAL@home] Restarting task fh_2_1748515_3264_0 using newFreeHAL version 130

however client carried on running until

24-Mar-2010 06:49:20 [---] Resource share out of range: 0.000000
24-Mar-2010 06:49:20 [---] Resource share out of range: 0.000000
24-Mar-2010 06:49:20 [---] Resource share out of range: 0.000000
24-Mar-2010 06:49:20 [---] Resource share out of range: 0.000000
24-Mar-2010 06:49:20 [---] Resource share out of range: 0.000000
24-Mar-2010 06:49:20 [---] Account manager contact succeeded
24-Mar-2010 08:30:34 [---] Starting BOINC client version 6.10.18 for windows_intelx86

thanks for the additional info regarding gpu's. Am learning slowly lol.

If that message only occurs once or twice a day, you can savely ignore it. I get it sometimes when the system clock is adjusted by the time server.

I don't know that one, but it seems to be correlated with the recent change of resource share handling, where now a resource share of zero is allowed and denotes a backup project. It doesn't sound critical either.

There are some other log files in the data directory, namely stderrdae.txt, stdoutgui.txt and stderrgui.txt, but I never found any useful information in them (at least for me ).

Gruß,
Gundolf

I get that Restarting task from Freehal every so often, I've usually found it's either a Internet Connection or Memory Problem. Sometimes I have to Abort the Tasks & clean out the BOINC Slots of Freehal Wu's & get fresh Wu's to get rid of the message ...

thanks to all who have helped. I may try clearing WU's if problem persists.

Ok having a thought here. Am using windows with two user accounts, if other user is still logged on when I log on could that be enough to cause problems? What happens in this situation, is it one client running with two GUI's or is it an individual client to each account. Should I shut boinc in my account if other user is still logged on, I ask this as when I went into one of the other text files as suggested by Gundolph it said 'another instance of boinc is running ' repeatedly for about 50 lines.

Perhaps in that situation (and because you are not using a GPU) it would be best to re-install BOINC in Protected Application Execution mode (formerly known as service mode), because then the BOINC client would be started once at boot time and not with each log in. It would even run if no one is logged on.

You don't need to uninstall first (I believe) and on re-install select the "Advanced" part. See also How to install BOINC as a service (BOINC 6 series) on Windows at the BOINC FAQ Service.

BOINC should resume working after the install were it left off before, but if you want to be sure that no work is lost, set No New Tasks and suspend all tasks ready to start. Then wait until all running tasks are uploaded and reported before you do the change to PAE mode.

Gruß,
Gundolf

Many thanks, I have followed the instructions for that. However, when reading faq it said ''If you allow BOINC to be controlled by all users on the computer, everyone can start BOINC Manager and attach to projects/detach from projects. When you uncheck this option and others want to run BOINC Manager, they will get a message saying to contact the administrator to add them to the 'boinc_users' group'', this is not happening, despite me unchecking the box, as when I logged into the other user account boinc was still in task bar and was able to attach to project, contact account manager etc.

26/03/2010 03:00:49 Starting BOINC client version 6.10.18 for windows_intelx86
26/03/2010 03:00:49 log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
26/03/2010 03:00:54 Libraries: libcurl/7.19.4 OpenSSL/0.9.8l zlib/1.2.3
26/03/2010 03:00:54 Running as a daemon
26/03/2010 03:00:54 Data directory: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\BOINC
26/03/2010 03:00:54 Running under account boinc_master
26/03/2010 03:01:00 Processor: 2 GenuineIntel Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz [x86 Family 15 Model 3 Stepping 4]
26/03/2010 03:01:00 Processor: 1.00 MB cache
26/03/2010 03:01:00 Processor features: fpu tsc sse sse2 mmx
26/03/2010 03:01:00 OS: Microsoft Windows XP: Home x86 Edition, Service Pack 3, (05.01.2600.00)
26/03/2010 03:01:00 Memory: 2.00 GB physical, 3.85 GB virtual
26/03/2010 03:01:00 Disk: 465.75 GB total, 440.11 GB free
26/03/2010 03:01:00 Local time is UTC +0 hours

Does this look correct to you or should I have changed the data directory, if so , to what please.
Also many thanks again for your very patient help on this matter.

ok so sorry, I found this ''The only users who can control BOINC are: the installing user, members of the Administrator group'', the other account on my pc is also an administrator account. So that answers that question. Finally how do I know if I am running boinc as a service now? sorry but did say at beginning I am still learning Thank you.

I think the main reason is that you are running XP home edition, which is lacking all the group and access right commands of a professional (server) edition.

The easiest way is to look at your Messages tab. As you can see, you do:

26/03/2010 03:00:54 Running as a daemon

You are welcome. And since you are learning, you can't be stupid.

Gruß,
Gundolf
[edit]The icon you see in the task bar/system tray is that of BOINC manager, and since the manager isn't nesessary to have the client running, you can make BOINC "invisible" with any one account by unchecking the "start at log on" check box in the exit dialog and removing all links to BOINC manager from the autostart folder in windows start menu. You could even remove the BOINC folder from the start menu Programs folder. All that doesn't prevent the user from invoking BOINC manager, but it gets more cumbersome. [/edit]

Ok thanks for that, have disabled boinc manager from other user account. One last question, I promise, upon doing this when I relogged into my account I had lost connection, I had to restart Boinc manager and when I went into my messages it said restarting tasks (listed them all) does this mean boinc is not running in the background when I log out now?

It should continue to run when you log out; it does for me, but I'm still running BOINC 5.10.45, so I'm not sure. In any case, you should check the exit dialog options of BOINC manager.

Was there a message before the restarting messages like "Resuming computation" or something like that?

When the client really got restarted, you'll see a line like the following:

26/03/2010 03:00:49 Starting BOINC client version 6.10.18 for windows_intelx86

Gruß,
Gundolf

Yes I had that message. Well since installing as a service the projects one by one failed giving me the reset project warning message. Upon looking at task manager my cpu was running at 100% continuously, so I have decided after being unable to use the internet etc to go back to the previous method and take my chances on the multiple user accounts problem.

Huge thanks to Gundolf for all the help, you have been so patient. I hope this thread is of help to others in some small way.

Ok problem resolved, did a search and found multiple boinc installations and data files etc despite using add or remove to uninstall, deleted boinc and used search function to find every trace of boinc on pc. Removed all and started over with a fresh installation. Running smoothly now, also the 'resource share zero' error message has also gone.