Difference between revisions of "Distributed Computing"

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The @Home program is designed to distribute computing in order to complete computations that would otherwise take an extremely long time, even on a supercomputer.
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Distributed computing programs are designed to allocate chunks of processing to many computers throughout the world in order to complete computations that would otherwise take an extremely long time, even on a supercomputer.
  
Known @Home projects include:
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==Available Projects==
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Known distributed computing projects include:
 
*[http://folding.stanford.edu/ Folding@Home] (Protein Folding)
 
*[http://folding.stanford.edu/ Folding@Home] (Protein Folding)
 
*[http://www.stanford.edu/group/pandegroup/genome/ Genome@home]
 
*[http://www.stanford.edu/group/pandegroup/genome/ Genome@home]
 
*[http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ SETI@Home] (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence)
 
*[http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ SETI@Home] (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence)
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*[http://www.mersenne.org/primenet/ PrimeNet] (Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search)
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*[http://distributed.net/projects.php distributed.net]
  
[[User:Chrax|I]] am considering starting [[MASMC|Academy]] teams on these sites, just for kicks, to see how much processing the Academy can dole out for the sake of science. If there is enough interest (i.e. 4 other people), I will sign them up and put the Team numbers here.
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[[User:Chrax|I]] am considering starting [[MASMC|Academy]] teams on these sites, just for kicks, to see how much processing the Academy can dole out for the sake of science. If there is enough interest (i.e. 4 people), in any of these projects, I will start an Academy team and post the team numbers here.
  
(Also, I think there are more, so if you've got your own preferred project, add it to the list.)
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There are quite probably more of these projects out there, so if you've got your own preferred project, add it to the list.
  
===Folding@Home===
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==Folding@Home==
 
Folding@Home is a Stanford run project that computes protein folding. While you may know that proteins have specific amino acid sequences, part of their functionality comes from the shape that results when the protein folds on itself, and Folding@Home is working to understand how proteins take these shapes.
 
Folding@Home is a Stanford run project that computes protein folding. While you may know that proteins have specific amino acid sequences, part of their functionality comes from the shape that results when the protein folds on itself, and Folding@Home is working to understand how proteins take these shapes.
  
 
The client can be found [http://folding.stanford.edu/download.html here]. For [[Linux]] users, simply <code>chmod +x</code> the program and run it, and it'll get going on its own. I would suggest giving it its own folder, so you don't accidentally delete something important.
 
The client can be found [http://folding.stanford.edu/download.html here]. For [[Linux]] users, simply <code>chmod +x</code> the program and run it, and it'll get going on its own. I would suggest giving it its own folder, so you don't accidentally delete something important.
  
===Genome@home===
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==Genome@home==
 
Genome@home is also run by Stanford, in an attempt to understand more about how genes work. This, combined with the research gained from the folding project, should increase our overall understanding of the gene->protein process and eventually allow us to be able to synthesize genes and make new proteins that would behave predictably.
 
Genome@home is also run by Stanford, in an attempt to understand more about how genes work. This, combined with the research gained from the folding project, should increase our overall understanding of the gene->protein process and eventually allow us to be able to synthesize genes and make new proteins that would behave predictably.
  
 
This project uses the Folding@Home client, so you'll have to check the Genome@home page for how to configure it to run Genome instead of Folding.
 
This project uses the Folding@Home client, so you'll have to check the Genome@home page for how to configure it to run Genome instead of Folding.
  
===SETI@Home===
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==SETI@Home==
 
[http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/download.html Download the client here], and make sure to read the instructions (for I have not).
 
[http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/download.html Download the client here], and make sure to read the instructions (for I have not).
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==PrimeNet==
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The goal of PrimeNet is to find as many Mersenne primes (primes that fit the description 2<sup>p</sup>-1) as they can. In May 2004, the 41st Mersenne was found (2<sup>24,036,583</sup>-1, which is around 7 million digits long). As I write this, the PrimeNet grid is doing about 15005 gigaflops, which is absolutely nuts even if you don't know what flops (floating point operations per second) are.
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You can get the software [http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft.htm here]. This is not a project in which you can work in teams, but neat nonetheless.
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==distributed.net==
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This is a particularly geeky distributed computing site that seems to be largely into mathematical and computational problems, such as encryption stress-testing and finding rulers such that no two marks are the same distance apart as any other pair of two marks.
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Clients can be found [http://distributed.net/download/clients.php here].

Revision as of 22:47, 1 January 2005

Distributed computing programs are designed to allocate chunks of processing to many computers throughout the world in order to complete computations that would otherwise take an extremely long time, even on a supercomputer.

Available Projects

Known distributed computing projects include:

I am considering starting Academy teams on these sites, just for kicks, to see how much processing the Academy can dole out for the sake of science. If there is enough interest (i.e. 4 people), in any of these projects, I will start an Academy team and post the team numbers here.

There are quite probably more of these projects out there, so if you've got your own preferred project, add it to the list.

Folding@Home

Folding@Home is a Stanford run project that computes protein folding. While you may know that proteins have specific amino acid sequences, part of their functionality comes from the shape that results when the protein folds on itself, and Folding@Home is working to understand how proteins take these shapes.

The client can be found here. For Linux users, simply chmod +x the program and run it, and it'll get going on its own. I would suggest giving it its own folder, so you don't accidentally delete something important.

Genome@home

Genome@home is also run by Stanford, in an attempt to understand more about how genes work. This, combined with the research gained from the folding project, should increase our overall understanding of the gene->protein process and eventually allow us to be able to synthesize genes and make new proteins that would behave predictably.

This project uses the Folding@Home client, so you'll have to check the Genome@home page for how to configure it to run Genome instead of Folding.

SETI@Home

Download the client here, and make sure to read the instructions (for I have not).

PrimeNet

The goal of PrimeNet is to find as many Mersenne primes (primes that fit the description 2p-1) as they can. In May 2004, the 41st Mersenne was found (224,036,583-1, which is around 7 million digits long). As I write this, the PrimeNet grid is doing about 15005 gigaflops, which is absolutely nuts even if you don't know what flops (floating point operations per second) are.

You can get the software here. This is not a project in which you can work in teams, but neat nonetheless.

distributed.net

This is a particularly geeky distributed computing site that seems to be largely into mathematical and computational problems, such as encryption stress-testing and finding rulers such that no two marks are the same distance apart as any other pair of two marks.

Clients can be found here.