How safe is WCG?

[SuperPhrank]

Currently, I am in the process of convincing my college, Milwaukee School of Engineering, to start running WCG on all of their computers. MSOE gives laptops to all of their students so that would mean around 2400 computers (i5 520m) and other desktops on campus that this would be deployed to. I had a meeting this week with the director of IT and he had a number of questions that I could not answer and was hoping that all of you could help me out.

One of the main things that he was worried about was network security. He wanted to know things like what ports it was using for communication and how safe the communication between the client and the servers are. Another thing he was worried about was rogue code execution of sorts. He did not want to put something that he really did not know what it is doing on this many computers which do have access to sensitive information. The biggest concern he had was that there would be compatibility issues between some of the software run on the computers and WCG. There are several hundred programs that MSOE students use and he really did not want to cause his department more trouble. Are there any programs that definitely have compatibility issues with WCG?

Thanks,
SuperPhrank

[Sparky]

I would be leery of deploying WCG on a bunch of laptops simply because the cooling design in many laptops may not be up to the task. Typically, laptop cooling isn't designed for 100% load for extended periods of time.

For network security, port 443 (and possibly 80) is used. Basic HTTPS connection, really, from what I gather by looking around. And I've never heard of BOINC getting hijacked.

For program compatibility, I haven't heard of WCG causing another program to not work.

[Otis11]

Ygpm.

[sierra_bound]

You can tell your IT person that a number of colleges and universities, including the University of Illinois and the University of Texas, participate in WCG. Also, major corporations, including IBM and Nike, take part. IBM staffs and runs the servers.

[BlindFreddie]

http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org contains quite a lot of information about the issues raised, especially in the Forums. Start Here: Community-maintained FAQs [read only] is particularly useful.

Security:
No security issues with running WCG have ever been discovered, and according to one of WCG's promo videos, IBM have employed would-be hackers to try. See Can I trust the World Community Grid software?
An issue related to security is that there can be issues when some virus scanners are run while the WCG software is running. If this is a problem, the BOINC Data Directory should be excluded from virus scans.

Running on laptops:
It is true that some laptops will run hotter than is desirable at 100% load, but many people do run WCG on them. In fact, in October 2010, it was announced that "Sony Electronics VAIO® computers now come equipped with IBM’s World Community Grid software." See Sony Assists Researchers With Humanitarian Research Projects
One option is to configure throttling of the WCG software to reduce the average load %.
Throttling can be done using the standard BOINC configuration parameters, but this is very "grainy" as it pauses for a number of whole seconds, probably because BOINC was developed on Unix, and generic Unix has this limitation. For Windows, Threadmaster performs much smoother throttling - see Threadmaster: The "Smooth" CPU Throttle for BOINC and anything else

Mass instalment of WCG:
See WCG About Us >> Marketing Toolkit >> Download the BOINC Mass Install Document (PDF) for instructions on installing World Community Grid across a large number of computers. Other stuff at Marketing Toolkit might be of interest to your IT guy too.

WCG Ports. URLs, etc:
See WCG Forums >> Start Here: Community-maintained FAQs [read only] >>
World Community Grid's related URLs and IP Addresses

Support is available via the WCG Forums, plus because MSOE is an institution rather than an idividual, by email to support@worldcommunitygrid.org, or via the Contact Us link at the bottom of the page at http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org . And of course, there are lots of knowledgeable eager helpers right here at XS too.

If MSOE do decide to contribute, I'm sure that WCG would like to know about it. They may welcome you as a "partner" and issue media releases. Good publicity for the school.

Finally, an association between MSOE and WCG may not be all one-way. As well as welcoming donated computer time, WCG offers a free supercomputing facility for suitable projects. Perhaps there are researchers at MSOE who could use it, in which case see Submit a Proposal

We all hope to be able to say "MSOE, welcome to The Grid" soon

[SuperPhrank]

Thanks a lot for your answers everybody, it has been very helpful. I am currently setting up another meeting and will keep you all updated on the progress.

I would be leery of deploying WCG on a bunch of laptops simply because the cooling design in many laptops may not be up to the task.

The laptop is HP Elitebook 8540w and actually has surprisingly good cooling. It normally runs around 75C at full load so this should not be a problem.

[tiro_uspsss]

Thanks a lot for your answers everybody, it has been very helpful. I am currently setting up another meeting and will keep you all updated on the progress.




The laptop is HP Elitebook 8540w and actually has surprisingly good cooling. It normally runs around 75C at full load so this should not be a problem.

just dont run them @ 100% f/t - easy way to make sure nothing goes south

[Kingcarcas]

Very unsafe, it's a ploy by Al Qaeda to take over the world.

[alucasa]

I wouldn't have it run at 100%. More like 50%~70% would be sufficient for the machines you mentioned. Wonderful things may happen when those machines are pushed to absolute max for an extended amount of time.

Installing and using WCG is as safe as installing firefox and using it.

[mreuter80]

Keep in mind, that WCG only refers to their version of BOINC and then only to their projects. I'm skeptical about other projects and would not run them in such an environment.

[Tom128]

I remember trying to get my college to run WCG and they didn't want to, from a range of reasons like electricity cost and "that's not what the machine was purchased for".

[64dragon]

I would not run WCG on a laptop, I did a few years ago on a Sony Vaio pentium 4 laptop and it degraded the thermalpaste to a point where watching a movie would cause it to overheat and throttle. I took the laptop apart and replaced the stock TIM with AS5 and it eventually killed that too. I was in the process of changing to ICD7 when the screwdriver slipped and I killed the laptop...

I know technology has changed a lot since then but heat is heat. With everyone trying to make devices in a smaller package it only gets worse.

I would think, as long as you set boinc to run when the pc is idle, there should be no issues with compatibility and other programs.

[haschioz]

hi,
i run on wcg on 100% on t4200 for about year and had no issues so far temps are between 60 and 70 when i watch dvds

[haschioz]

hi,
i run on wcg on 100% on t4200 for about year and had no issues so far temps are between 60 and 70 when i watch dvds

[Otis11]

Yeah... 64Dragon, IDK how that happened to you, but I've been running WCG on this laptop 24/7/365 for 17 months now. It runs non stop for 3 months, gets packed up for a few hours, thrown around in a backpack and then another 3 months... and it's still going strong. Under full load i'm looking at 60C which is exactly what it started at on week 1.

[slaveondope]

5 year old IBM T60 been spinning wheels for ~10 months now. Might look into under volting all them to save power/heat but thats a lot of laptops to setup Im sure

[SuperPhrank]

After several emails back and forth with the director of IT, things ended up not working out so well for various reasons. So now I am moving on to what was my backup plan which is essentially going from door to door in the dorms asking for people to put it on their laptop.

So now I'm wondering if anybody knows of a way to make the install process easier. Something that would make it so there is no need for any user input or the restart at the end of the install. All of the students would probably be joined under the same user name to avoid the need for them to make new accounts.

[artemm]

Silent install with weak key with option for no reboot.

4 Deployment using software distribution system (Scenario #1)
The instructions below provide details on how to prepare World Community Grid’s BOINC client so that it can be
deployed silently from the command line. After performing these modifications, the command line will install the
client and automatically attach to World Community Grid using the specified member.
4.1 Determine Installer Properties
The installer requires some information during initial execution to install quietly on a system. These three are
critical for mass deployments:
1. PROJINIT_AUTH: Obtain the weak account key for the member name that you want the computers to
register under by visiting https://secure.worldcommunitygrid.or...ewMyProfile.do. (You will find it
near the bottom of the page next to the text that says ‘weak account key’.) This setting is required.
2. ENABLESCREENSAVER: Default is 1 which sets the operating system to use the World Community Grid
screen saver. If you wish to not set the screen saver, then include ENABLESCREENSAVER=0 in the
commandline.
3. ENABLEPROTECTEDAPPLICATIONEXECUTION2: Default is 0. This is used to set application
sandboxing for improved security. It also sets whether or not to run as a service. If you want to enable
protected execution and run as a service, then include
ENABLEPROTECTEDAPPLICATIONEXECUTION2=1 on the command line.
For more advanced options please visit
http://boinc.berkeley.edu/wiki/Creat...ler_properties or contact
support@worldcommunitygrid.org .
4.2 Execute the installer
Now that all the options have been determined, the following command can be used to install the World Community
Grid BOINC client:
wcg_boinc_6.10.58_windows_intelx86.exe /S /v"/qn PROJINIT_AUTH=weakaccountkey
ENABLEPROTECTEDAPPLICATIONEXECUTION2=1"
As part of the installation, the computer will be rebooted. If you need to disable this, you can run the following
command. Please note that the computer MUST be restarted, before the software can start running.
wcg_boinc_6.10.58_windows_intelx86.exe /S /v"/norestart /qn PROJINIT_AUTH=weakaccountkey
ENABLEPROTECTEDAPPLICATIONEXECUTION2=1"
Please note that there are several installation types and additional installation options available for World
Community Grid’s BOINC client. Please view this page to see them:
http://boinc.berkeley.edu/wiki/Creat...tom_installers or contact support@worldcommunitygrid.org
If using any of these other options, please test them to make sure that they work correctly.
The BOINC client will not start automatically after running this command. It will start after reboot.

[SuperPhrank]

Thanks, didn't realize that was in the mass install document.