Hi,

first of all, I'm posting this because I finally found the solution to my problem but could'nt find all the answers easily. So I'm writting a little how-to for those who start on the BOINC system with only a command line. Here I will not detail technically every point as further information can be found through the net (do a Google serach).

I'm using BOINC on a Gentoo server with only the command line (no GUI, no pretty flowers around it...). My server is behind a router on a local network. I managed to attach to the Climate Prediction but never to the Seti@home, always getting errors. I tried to attach to the Seti@home from another location and it worked so the account was valid.

Steps to follow :

* download the package into the wanted folder


wget http://einstein.aset.psu.edu/download/boinc/dl/boinc_5.2.13_i686-pc-linux-gnu.sh


* once it's in the correct folder (the one where you will launch it from), you must extract it


sh boinc_5.2.13_i686-pc-linux-gnu.sh


* if needed, create an account on the needed project
Seti@home account form
* once you have your key, do the test run launching it manually


./boinc -attach_project http://setiathome.berkeley.edu <key>

Here is when it becomes complicated, it can either work fine and in that case it's almost finished, or it can just fail with a connection error. If you get the connection error, you can try to reduce the MTU :

ifconfig eth0 mtu 1000

(if using eth0)
This seems to be a known problem with some routers on the internet just droping large packets, also knwon as MTU Black-Holes. Then retry the test run and it should work. If not, try with another project such as Climate Prediction to see if you can connect it.

If you manage to get through this first part and get it calculating for the Seti, you might want it to run in the background (as a service) and eventually start with the server. This is how I done it though it's not the only solution.

* in the

/etc/init.d/

folder, you just check a few simple other scripts in there. Once you have found one with just

start/stop/restart

you can copy the file to the name

boinc

.


cp goodone boinc


* then you need to modify the file (of course), else it won't be any use (see my sample at the end)
* give it a try


/etc/init.d/boinc start


* Once the daemon is created you need to add it to the startup. Personally I put it as default


rc-update add boinc default

Now you should have your system calculating fine...
==============================================
Sample boinc daemon script :

#!/sbin/runscript

# script to start BOINC as daemon

depend() {
        # daemon needs the net
        need net
}

start() {
        # show a message
        ebegin "Starting Boinc daemon"
        # Start the process
	# --exec must point to the command directly (here I have a folder BOINC on the root)
	# --pidfile must point to the file created when process is runing
        start-stop-daemon --start --background [color=red]--pidfile /var/run/boinc.pid --make-pidfile --exec /BOINC/boinc[/color]
        # output success or failure
        eend $?
}

stop() {
        # show a message
        ebegin "Stopping Boinc daemon"
        # Stop the process
        start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet [color=red]--pidfile /var/run/boinc.pid --name boinc[/color]
        # output success or failure
        eend $?
}

restart() {
        svc_stop
        svc_start
}

==============================================

---

Hi,

first of all thanks for your tips, but i remain with the following problem, i get the following error after using your sample script in the init.d directory:

[root@WR3Server run]# /etc/init.d/boinc start
-bash: /etc/init.d/boinc: /sbin/runscript: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

Can you tell me what i do wrong?

---

Hi,

first of all thanks for your tips, but i remain with the following problem, i get the following error after using your sample script in the init.d directory:

[root@WR3Server run]# /etc/init.d/boinc start
-bash: /etc/init.d/boinc: /sbin/runscript: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

Can you tell me what i do wrong?

Does your boinc script have run permissions set?

---

Hi,

first of all thanks for your tips, but i remain with the following problem, i get the following error after using your sample script in the init.d directory:

[root@WR3Server run]# /etc/init.d/boinc start
-bash: /etc/init.d/boinc: /sbin/runscript: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

Replace the #!/sbin/runscript at the beginning of the script with a reference to your shell of preference. e.g. #! /bin/bash.