Latest Version of BoincTasks (1.59 May 2014)

[CHElliott]

The latest version of BoincTasks (1.59 May 2014) will not install on Windows 8; it says there is an error in a language file, Butang, I believe.

Version 1.58 runs fine on Windows 8, though.

[Dr Who Fan]

Since upgrading to this version I am randomly seeing unusually HIGH CPU usage times of anywhere between 30 to almost 50% after it has been running anywhere between 8 to 12 hours causing almost everything to grind to a halt on my PC until I shutdown and restart BoincTasks again.

PC SPECS:
Windows Vista (32-bit) Home Premium with all the latest updates
3GB RAM
320 GB HDD (200+GB free)
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3800+

Below is the Debug info generated at most recent startup for BoincTasks:

• 07 May 2014 - 13:18:01 Logging ---- Start debug mode
  07 May 2014 - 13:18:01
  07 May 2014 - 13:18:01 BoincTasks version: 1.59
  07 May 2014 - 13:18:01 Language ---- User: 1033 (ENU), System: 1033 (ENU), Selected: 0 () Used: 1033 (ENU)
  07 May 2014 - 13:18:02 Maximum number of computers: Unlimited
  07 May 2014 - 13:18:02 Computers ---- localhost get local password: (C:\BOINCData\\gui_rpc_auth.cfg)
  ... [DELETED] ...
  07 May 2014 - 13:18:31 Memory ----
     PageFaultCount      : 0x00004BC2   19K
     PeakWorkingSetSize   : 0x01ECF000   32305K
     WorkingSetSize      : 0x01C27000   29519K
     QuotaPeakPagedPool   : 0x00068160   426K
     QuotaPagedPool      : 0x0003E050   254K
     QuotaPeakNonPagedPool   : 0x00058C9C   363K
     QuotaNonPagedPool   : 0x00002D20   11K
     Pagefile         : 0x013BF000   20705K
     PeakPagefile      : 0x01D31000   30609K

Any help appreciated

[fred]

The latest version of BoincTasks (1.59 May 2014) will not install on Windows 8; it says there is an error in a language file, Butang, I believe.

Version 1.58 runs fine on Windows 8, though.

Not much changed in 1.59.
I run Win 8.1 so that's not the issue.
Look at the BoincTasks log it shows a line like this:
08 May 2014 - 10:00:26 Language ---- User: 1033 (ENU), System: 1033 (ENU), Selected: 0 () Used: 1033 (ENU)
Can you give me your line.

[fred]

Since upgrading to this version I am randomly seeing unusually HIGH CPU usage times of anywhere between 30 to almost 50% after it has been running anywhere between 8 to 12 hours causing almost everything to grind to a halt on my PC until I shutdown and restart BoincTasks again.

What was the previous version, and what's the version that you are using now?

The only thing that should use CPU time is memory, go to BoincTasks settings -> History.
"Smart mode"
Minimum update time 30 seconds or more
Maximum update time 120 seconds.

Set the Remove history to a lower value.
Check Move to long term history after 1 days.

[Dr Who Fan]

What was the previous version, and what's the version that you are using now?

The only thing that should use CPU time is memory, go to BoincTasks settings -> History.
"Smart mode"
Minimum update time 30 seconds or more
Maximum update time 120 seconds.

Set the Remove history to a lower value.
Check Move to long term history after 1 days.

Current version 1.59
Previous version 1.58.1

I have updated settings per your recommendations.
Strange thing is it's now been running fine almost 21 hours with out any problems. I will post back if I see any more problems.

[fred]

I have updated settings per your recommendations.
Strange thing is it's now been running fine almost 21 hours with out any problems. I will post back if I see any more problems.

Did you restart your system in between? It may be just a glitch in the system.

[Dr Who Fan]

Did you restart your system in between? It may be just a glitch in the system.

No system restart just exited and restarted BoincTasks after last hang-up 23 hrs ago.  Still working fine. Thanks for your advice.

[CHElliott]

Not much changed in 1.59.
I run Win 8.1 so that's not the issue.
Look at the BoincTasks log it shows a line like this:
08 May 2014 - 10:00:26 Language ---- User: 1033 (ENU), System: 1033 (ENU), Selected: 0 () Used: 1033 (ENU)
Can you give me your line.

I looked thru all the logs and could not find one that mentioned version 1.59.  When tried to re-create the problem by installing 1.59 again, it installed w/o problems.  That was several days ago, and it has run w/o issues since.

[fred]

That was several days ago, and it has run w/o issues since.

Great to see you got it working.

[JeromeC]

Hi

I also installed 1.59 recently with wine under Mac OS X Mavericks, there are several wine processes running at the same time, one of them is eating an average of 20% of one core, or above, and one wineserver process is eating 9% of one core at the time, that's min 30% of one core... it was not like that with the old version I was using (I think 1.4, it's deleted now )...

Problem is that I also upgraded wine, I now run 1.61 and I was also using an old version, and things have changed because it was launching XQuartz when I ran BT before, but not anymore, only wine is ran now, I don't know why. So it's not only BT but that was upgraded, so I cannot swear that "the fault" is on BT, or wine, or else...

But still it's a lot of CPU, I have tried the setup you mention above but it didn't change anything. Especially in the tasks view it is refreshing the display every 2/3 secs, that's a lot, I would be happy with 5 secs of even more, but I saw no setup to change this.

Thanks.


edit : it occurred to me a simple test, I switch to the notification tab, where nothing is supposed to change for a long delay, but still the CPU use is the same for the 2 processes I mentioned. I'm afraid "that's the way it is" with this version (or wine / BT version combination)...

[fred]

But still it's a lot of CPU, I have tried the setup you mention above but it didn't change anything. Especially in the tasks view it is refreshing the display every 2/3 secs, that's a lot, I would be happy with 5 secs of even more, but I saw no setup to change this.

Go to BoincTasks Settings -> History and remove the check at "Enable history logging".
Check if this helps.

Second, in the computer tab do you connect with the IP Address or with the MAC Address?

[JeromeC]

Removing the history ? Hum, the main reason why I use BT is because of the history, for all the rest the regular Boinc Manager is quite enough (and reactive, and not eating resources...) for my small needs (I don't have a farm, just my Mac), so not being able to remember the history after reboot or any reason, well, it's no good for me... I have tried what you say and now wine is using avg 17% and wineserver 8%, so only a little less. I put it back and it's not really changing, it seems I have now have 17% + 8%.

Besides, regularly (at least once per day so far), with the new wine + new BT (again I don't know if the problem is BT of wine) BT freezes and becomes responsless, I have a wine task  eating a lot a CPU and not responding (and if restart BT first I'll have another wine task adding, this one will remain), I have to kill it and restart BT...

Second : I connect with "localhost"

[fred]

Removing the history ?

The history is the only one that should consume some CPU time.
On the latest client go to BoincTasks Settings -> History and change "Minimum update time" to 60 seconds.

But from what you tell this isn't the issue.
Closing BoincTasks [X], if fact only hiding it should put it in lowest possible mode.

I will check on some other thing I can think off.

[JeromeC]

Changing the parameter has no effect, but "closing / hiding" is much more efficient : wine process goes down to 10-11% and winserver down to 2%, so it's 12-13% of one core, that's much more reasonable.

Besides I found out that letting BT on the notice view when I'm not using it prevents the freeze to happen anymore. I used to let it on the app tab in the past, and with this version (combined with wine version) I had the freeze, so not anymore.

So I think I now have a way to use BT with enough piece of mind now

[fred]

Changing the parameter has no effect, but "closing / hiding" is much more efficient : wine process goes down to 10-11% and winserver down to 2%, so it's 12-13% of one core, that's much more reasonable.

Besides I found out that letting BT on the notice view when I'm not using it prevents the freeze to happen anymore. I used to let it on the app tab in the past, and with this version (combined with wine version) I had the freeze, so not anymore.

So I think I now have a way to use BT with enough piece of mind now

The Notices tab is Windows, it probably uses parts of the Internet Explorer, so that may not be implemented (correctly) in Wine.