Folding on Linux thread

Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own wayNaples, FL Icrontian
edited June 2004 in Science & Tech
First off, this is here for mcwc (morgan) and others who want to fold on Linux. I will be talking about Linux, and could have done an ID create to post in the Folding Team area, but will post here instead as most of this will be Linux specific and by my request I have access here and not post access nor view access under my normal(and only) ID to the folding team threads due to beta work which requires an NDA agreement to beta fold.

ALL the folding clients are cooperative for Linux and BSD, as are the Windows clients. This means they will not take 100% of time slices of CPU in any O\S, they are designed to be low-priority processes that in fact allow other more important things to run. This is and has been for the history of Folding designed into the processes used.

I fold on Linux, right now am also using Mandrake 10 Official.

Folding from a Konsole in KDE yields a very slow fold. folding by using CTRL-ALT-F2 to get to a pure console, logging in as user (my user is john) with user password, and running the client with -configonly gets you into the config process. At that point, if you tell the config script YES for advanced config, you have a chance to set the time slices the client will ask for when Linux lets the process have CPU time among other things.

Set the following for best results:

Priority to idle (low makes client run slower, is for a multiple client setup or where a box is doing folding and SETI, for example).

There will come a point where the client will talk about the number of time slices as a percentage. It defaults to 96% and I run at 97% or 98% (change default of 96 to 98, try thta, if things stumble, drop to 97 with another -configonly switch call). This percentage is used same as in Windows clients, higher in client config is better.

Some users set up "the whole kitchen sink" in Linux, ie many services they do not need run. To get Linux to give a cooperative process time more often, best strategy is to disable the services you do not need. Samba is often not needed unless you are using teh Linux box to serve and share files to windows boxes.

In Mandrake, you can disable services and enable them in the Mandrake Control Center. I would say to definitely not run Apache and Samba and uneededs if you do not use them. Once disabled in Mandrake Control Center, they will stay disabled through restart\reboots and cold boots, the scripts actually write to the config files.

If you have no use for a printer, you can also kill cupsd and lpd. Look for things you do not need running and kill those services.

As an example, my folding and all other processes are taking up 1.7% of my Northwood's capacity, floats up and down to 10% in top. But, folding is faster for same WU on same hardware versus XP Pro console run clients, by time actual for WU completes from start time.

Comments

  • mcwcmcwc Vancouver, BC Member
    edited June 2004
    Thanks for the help John. Right now, I can't do any of that yet as the power went out some time during the night and both my main rig and laptop turned off. I am now having trouble getting Linux to boot. I'm going to start another thread to see what help I can get to get Linux booting again.
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    edited June 2004
    I posted about that part in your problem thread, just before I looked here. sorry about that, but think maybe I can help you fix it if you can follow what is there. Ask if NOT, ok??
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