My thinking about the BOINC developers is that they have a 
"hands-off" goal - the user installs BOINC, chooses the projects, 
and never touches the thing again.  But I believe in "hands-on" -- 
if I see something I don't like, I want to intervene (rather than 
depend upon "the software will take care of everything").  [And what 
I don't like is my system going idle before I can connect again.]

For a long time, there have been two points I've sought to convey:

  1)  While the BOINC holy grail is "never miss a deadline" - when I 
intervene, I have taken upon *myself* the responsibility of whether 
deadlines are met.  [So don't prevent me from intervening, on the 
grounds that letting me do it might cause a deadline to be missed.]

  2)  The time-to-crunch-and-report is just one element in a whole 
process.  Before crunching is done, it takes time for the server to 
create and send out the workunit.  After crunching is done, it takes 
time for the results to be gathered and analyzed.  If the project 
tolerates "slack" in those two elements, it ought to tolerate 
"slack" in the time-to-crunch-and-report.  [Again - please let me 
"hands-on" request more work when the "hands-off" client does not. 
Please let *me* worry about whether letting me do so might cause a 
deadline miss in the "time-to-crunch-and-report" portion of the big 
picture.]


> But hey, it's your call.  I have my opinion, and that is if you care
> enough to be on the developers list, you should contribute.

I'm on the developers list because it tells me what the developers 
are thinking.  The alternative is to stop caring - that way 
eventually points to my completely dropping the use of BOINC.  Is 
that what you are suggesting for me?

I'm willing to contribute ideas gained from a long career in 
computers (my start was writing programs for the IBM 705, still a 
vacuum tube machine).  I had a bunch of discussions with the BOINC 
developers in 2006.  But it is hard to keep on "caring enough".

mikus

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