Hello, I've been using Rosetta@home for a bit over a month now and have been trying to troubleshoot a mysterious issue.

I have BOINC running Rosetta@home on two Windows PCs. Every now and then, when I check my stats it looks like I have zero tasks and no recent credit even though the program has been running in the background.

When I open the account_boinc.bakerlab.org_rosetta.xml file on my computer, I notice that the <authenticator> tag shows an account key value that is different from what is shown under my account keys on the boinc.bakerlab.org website. To fix this, I remove Rosetta@home in the BOINC Manager program and re-add the project as an existing user (using the same credentials I use to login to the boinc.bakerlab.org site).

After the project is re-added, my correct account key shows up in the account_boinc.bakerlab.org_rosetta.xml file; everything is fine. However, when I check back some time later, the <authenticator> key in the xml file gets reverted back to the incorrect value. It always changes to the same incorrect value.

This happens on both computers that I have running BOINC, and I believe it occurs whenever the machine is rebooted. Does anyone have an idea why this is happening? Is the BOINC Manager reading a preference or cookie or something upon startup that is re-writing my account key information?

Upon further inspection, it appears that my account key is being overwritten with an incorrect value whenever I invoke the Update Project command. I'm not sure why it is overwriting the authenticator or where BOINC Manager is pulling the incorrect from.

I can't think of any reason why this wold occur, let alone how- other than possibly another account with the same user name. Which shouldn't occur.

I'd suggest contacting the project admin about the issue- give them your present user name, user ID number & email used for attaching to the project, and the changed values that you are getting & they should be able to check to see if there is some sort of duplicate in the system that might be causing this issue.

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Grant
Darwin NT

Thank you. I thought I had it figured out -- I found the incorrect account key in a couple of config files, so I replaced them with the proper key value. Everything seemed OK for some time, then tonight I manually issued a project update, and my account_boinc.bakerlab.org_rosetta.xml file somehow reverted to the old account keys. :(

I will confer with a project admin, but how do I find out who that person is and how do I contact them?

Everything seemed OK for some time, then tonight I manually issued a project update, and my account_boinc.bakerlab.org_rosetta.xml file somehow reverted to the old account keys. :(

Which makes no sense as the BOINC client has to contact the project servers to report completed work & request new work. A manual update is no different.

I will confer with a project admin, but how do I find out who that person is and how do I contact them?

With difficulty.
Best option would be to send a Private Message to the Admin user account. Given it's the weekend now (or soon will be in the US), it could be a few days into the new work week before you're likely to get a response.


The other option would be to post the problem on the BOINC message boards- they may have come across it before and know what the cause and fix are.

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Grant
Darwin NT

Problem solved, possibly.

I finally figured out that the incorrect account key belonged to another person who had installed BOINC on both this computer (years ago) and on the second computer (months ago). Through trial and error, I was able to login with the account key and his email address.

Although that person had previously uninstalled the BOINC Manager, his ID somehow remained on both machines. Similarly, when I encountered issues and uninstalled and re-installed BOINC, the client kept attaching to the original (incorrect) account periodically, as described in the initial posting.

To fix this, my computer helper uninstalled the BOINC Manager, then combed through the Windows registry and deleted every key contining a BOINC reference. After reinstalling and re-adding the project, things seem to be going smoothly. I tested it out by issuing a "Project Update" command, as well as shutting down and restarting the client, and the correct account ID (mine) is being used.

Then we repeated the same steps on the second PC. So far, so good.

I'm not sure if this needs to be reported as a possible bug, but it seems that the BOINC Manager may not uninstall cleanly, and that may cause problems if it is reinstalled and associated with a different account or email address.

Glad you got it sorted.
Probably worth a post to the BOINC forums to let them know what occurred & what was needed to resolve it.

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Grant
Darwin NT

Thanks - I've posted a copy of the possible resolution to the BOINC forum.

Also some additional information: when the BOINC Manager was uninstalled and the registry cleared of BOINC keys, the ~ProgramDataBOINC data folder was also removed (actually, renamed) prior to reinstallation.