![]() I'd call that a GPU utilization factor and it existed before it was adjustable by the user. I was aiming at the server including something like Bernd avoided this pain and suffering by developing the GPU utilization factor as a project configuration option, easily settable by the user. I think that prior to that, people had to use the very user unfriendly app_info.xml mechanism if they wanted to schedule more than 1 concurrent task per GPU. As I recall (my memory is hazy because I wasn't using GPUs at the time) the app_config.xml mechanism came in around late 2012 with BOINC 7.0.42 or something like that. If you get it wrong, it doesn't work (which is fair enough), but no damage is done - you can go back and try again. You only have to mention the single application you wish to modify, and even then, most elements are optional. ![]() One typing error, and you have to go back to the beginning, probably losing your cached work and/or your program files in the process.Īpp_config.xml is much simpler. And you have to do it all over again every time the project updates any of its application types. Not only do you to have to specify every detail of the application you want to test or deploy, you have to supply every file that the application needs to run, and you have to to the same for every other application running at the same project. GPU utilization factor only comes into effect when new work is fetched for the specific application being controlled: app_config (mostly) comes into effect immediately - the exception is the later enhancement to control multi-threaded applications via cmdline, which only works for newly-started tasks - but often the BOINC Manager display takes some time to catch up.Īpp_info.xml is an absolutely nightmare for anyone except experienced developers to use. AFAIK, Bernd's implementation of GPU utilization factor via the the project website remains unique to Einstein to this day.īoth techniques are clunky, and have their individual drawbacks. It was first introduced a few days earlier with v7.0.40, but that version was buggy and unusable. app_config.xml was first usable with v7.0.42, available for testing from 12 December 2012. For me it was a real problem until I bit the bullet and deployed app_config.xml on every single host with a GPU. Of course this is of no concern to people with less than 4 computers, since there are 4 venues available to house the different preference sets. ![]() Every other host you have in the same venue gets the same change in settings. It was just easier to set cpu_usage to 0.35 and gpu_usage to 0.33 through app_config.xml to get the 3+1 task mixture I wanted to test.įor me, however, the biggest disadvantage of GPU utilization factor is not the above but rather that it is tied to venues. Sure, I could reduce the allowed cores to 50% which would do the job but at the expense of always having a free core even if there were no GPU tasks running at the time. A GPU factor of 0.33 would give the three tasks but would also always allow 2 CPU tasks, which I didn't want. I wanted to try 3 GPU tasks and then experiment with CPU tasks. When using that factor, the server supplied cpu_usage of 0.2 and gpu_usage of 0.5 would allow 2 CPU tasks and 2 concurrent GPU tasks to run. Sure it's not quite as convenient as editing a single number in the GPU utilization preference box but once you have a basic file installed, editing, followed by a click on 'reread config files' is quick, simple and convenient - and part of the user interface :-).Īs an example of its usefulness, I wanted to tweak a dual core host with a GTX650 that had been running with a GPU utilization factor of 0.5. It's really quite easy to use compared to app_info.xml. Quote: While I agree that app_config is the most potent tool for fine tuning, I don't like the way it is implemented. I don't remember exactly when the GPU utilization factor came in but my understanding is that it was unique to Einstein when first introduced. I may be wrong and I'm sure someone will correct me if I am. As I understand it, the success of that feature led to the BOINC Devs, some time later, adopting the idea and providing the functionality through app_config.xml. I think you mean the user-defined utilization factor was added by Bernd, right? Surely the utilization factor must have existed before that. Quote: The GPU utilization factor was a feature added by Bernd before BOINC had a suitable mechanism of its own.
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