I've been thinking of starting a Folding@Home team for the Bom.

What is Folding@Home? Check out their web site (http://folding.stanford.edu/). Basically, Stanford University needs to do massive calculations and simulations of protein folding (or mis-folding) to see how they affect a number of diseases and cancers. Obviously, it would take a lifetime of they were to do it on their own...so they're outsourcing...so to speak.

Here's how it works:
You download their software, which receives info from their servers. Your computer (or PlayStation 3) does the calculations/simulations, and then sends the results back to Stanford. To spice things up a bit, people can join teams and compete against other teams.

Anyway, would anyone be interested in joining a BoM Folding@Home team?

(oh, and I was serious about the PS3. The CPU inside a PS3 is ideal for what F@H needs, and therefore can yield greater results, faster. :thumb: ) :rolling:

Poll Information
This poll contains 1 question(s). 14 user(s) have voted.
You may not view the results of this poll without voting.

Poll Results: A BoM Folding @ Home Team? (14 votes.)

Would you join and participate in a BoM Folding @ Home Team? (Choose 1)
* Yes - 43% (6)
* No - 36% (5)
* Just the results for me - 21% (3)

So, Stanford wants to use everyone's computers to do math problems? What will this do to my computer?

After doing a little reading I voted yes. But I am still on dial-up so do not know if this would affect anything.

Why not put my computer to some worthwhile use.

So, Stanford wants to use everyone's computers to do math problems? What will this do to my computer? I have a small bit of experience with what I assume is a similar program, which was called Prime 95. My dad had it on my computer when I was a kid, and it was designed to find Mersenne Primes (special kind of number). Basically what it does is takes up some of your computer's resources to make a long set of calculations, which leaves you with slightly less resources while it's running, but I'm betting they put a pause function on their program like there was on Prime 95, for those rare times when you need full computing power. Ultimately, you probably won't even notice a difference, aside from the feeling that you're contributing to a good cause.

Personally, I'm saying no. My reasons are my own, and I won't discuss them. It's nothing any of you need to worry about, though.

I'm going to side with Fel on this one and say no. Just sounds a bit unusual.

It's perfectly safe and goes back years, so it's not some untested novelty. Nothing to be afraid of, in short. However, since I'm already running more background processes eating up my resources than I'd like, I've never participated in this project (or any similar ones).

I have a PPPoE connection with a ridiculous 1 GB download/upload quota per month, which is about what I use during a month (I keep downloading to a strict minimum), and additional bandwidth is ridiculously expensive. Also, my connection is not permanant - I bring it up on-demand.

In short, no.

So...that's 5 "No"s, 2 "Yes"s...

Any other takers? Remember, like Tal said, this project (and others like it) have been going on for years.

IIRC, F@H *does* have a pause button...so you can just stop it when you are using your computer, and then resume when you're done. I've been known to leave my computer running for up to 20 hours at a time...and 90% of that time I'm either at work or sleeping. F@H would make use of that time. :rolling:

I voted yes... Why not if it helps people.

This is certainly a worth cause and from what I've read you have several options. Some of the projects have deadlines and some don't. Although I am on dial-up my computer is on most of the time unless I am away. I plan to let F@H run at night.

Yeh, im up for this, i spend most of my time on my laptop, so my desktop is sitting unused, might aswell do something useful with it.

I would, but does it have a linux compatible program? And my download/upload limit is 20/10go, and I don't want to bust that limit.