At P2PU, people work together to learn a particular topic by completing tasks, assessing individual and group work, and providing constructive feedback.
This course will become read-only in the near future. Tell us at community.p2pu.org if that is a problem.
Learn to contribute to science using BOINC software
Important scientific projects need you!
After completing this challenge you will be able to participate in scientific projects which are working to cure diseases, study global warming, discover pulsars and conduct other types of research all over the world. You will be able to contribute processing time on your PC or laptop, and through the message boards of the projects, you will have the chance to learn more about the research that is motivating these projects.
This challenge will show you how to download, install and run the software you need to enable you to join the volunteer computing projects that are supported by the open source platform, BOINC.
posted message: My name is Victor and I am very new, as matter of fact I am less than 24 hours into the concept of being a citizen scientist. I am a third year Information Technology student at Sikkim Manipal University, I am interested in learning more and subsequently contributing to the body of knowledge.
posted message: I have been using BIONIC software for a number of years now... I am contributing to: SETI@Home, Constellation, FightMalaria@Home and QuakeCatcherNetwork.
I am presently part-way through a Bachelor of Science degree and I am looking for inspiration so I can eventually work towards postgraduate studies.
posted message: Becoming a Citizen Scientist was a fun and rewarding challenge. I am contributing by using BIONIC software. The project I chose Is called Milkyway@Home. I cannot wait to learn more about these subjects and collecting my first badge. Peace for now. MC-M
posted message: Hi this is my first project here on P2PU. My name is Marc Cinq-Mars and I am interested in becoming a citizen scientist for several reasons. First I want to increase my learning potential. Also I have spare computer time. It feels good to help a cause I am passionate about. And a love for computers also helps,
posted message: I am trying to get my BOINC.SlackBuild script to compile the gui but have been running into compile errors. If anyone wants to try and help getting the gui to c ompile on Slackware linux please visit https://github.com/KaMiila/BOINC-SlackBuild and submit your changes to the upstream git. As you can see right now, I have the gui turned off in the build script.
As a note on the gui, you cannot use the stock Cmake with Slackware, you need to upgrade Cmake, the best way to do this is to grab the latest STABLE release of Cmake, edit the cmake.SlackBuild in the /sources directory on the install dvd, tell it to use the new version you just downloaded, then run the script. Then installpkg /tmp/foo.t?z
posted message: I have been doing @home computer projects since seti@home and joined on the 31st of March 2001. Since then I have taken part in about 57 separate projects on multiple computers.
I am ex military but due to a severe accident, I had to end that career. The injuury broke the bones in my neck, twisted the ones in my mid-back, broke my low back and pelvis, and I also ended up with a head injury.
I then worked in the computer field & that allowed me to have multiple computers running BOINC projects for years. I enjoy the science, learning about the projects, and contributing to them.
Due to the worsening of my injuries over the years I am now 100% disabled and spend all my time, and all my spare money on computers to run more projects with!
posted message: I have been participating in these projects since 2005, and now, I'm in two - Seti and Rosetta. Setting up my last PC, I found it easier to set up BAM account (http://boincstats.com/en/page/profile/user/123875). If anyone needs any help setting up BOINC on Windows machine, I'm avilable for giving step by step instructions :) Still, I haven't managed to set up BOINC on my unix stations, but their computing power is too low, for significant results. Good luck and have fun being citizen scientist! :)
posted message: Ah! Why this projects? Well, E@H with the search for gravitational waves. To find such waves would be a breakthrough for physics. And the search for radiao and gamma ray pulsars, with a lot of success in finding radio pulsars.
LHC and T4T because it is very interesting to find out, how our world is built. And there is still a lot to discover. See Higgs particle
posted message: MY Name is Bernhard Asenbauer
I've started to crunch for boinc projects a couple of years ago. I'm walking through this challange, to see how it works.
posted message: My name is Chuck Thomas. I currently live in Jacksonville, Florida with my wife of 10 years, Christina. I am seeking my degree in Computer Information Systems. I graduated from Hillsborough Community College with my A.A. degree in May of 2011.
The first projects I explored was climateprediction.net and cosmolgy@home, both of which excited me to no end. As I, through my computer, could be of benefit to all of humanity! Not that I've got "the big head" or anything!
I later learned about Test4Theory, and how my computer could be put to use by CERN! How could I pass this opportunity up?
As to spreading the message, I post to facebook, talk to classmates, and even include information about Boinc in papers for school.
posted message: Well, the three tasks seem very interesting and well described, however I'm an expert in BOINC, so if this is your first time with BOINC any feedback about the challenge and its tasks will be welcome!