VMware (linux) Client Help

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Hi all - i set up the linux client (on Ubuntu) in VMware in the last few days and it has been crunching away happily, and tonight finished its first WU. However, i have had a few problems... The WU finished, and the client shutdown, but the terminal window showed a message along the lines of 'no access to mpich' - i think (unforutnately i did not keep the screen open to write it down, and FAHmon and the log files do not seem to have recorded the error). The log file reads as follows:

Code:
[23:20:16] Completed 247500 out of 250000 steps  (99%)
[23:30:51] Completed 250000 out of 250000 steps  (100%)
[23:31:52] 
[23:31:52] Finished Work Unit:
[23:31:52] - Reading up to 21141072 from "work/wudata_01.trr": Read 21141072
[23:31:54] trr file hash check passed.
[23:31:54] - Reading up to 27623324 from "work/wudata_01.xtc": Read 27623324
[23:31:55] xtc file hash check passed.
[23:31:55] edr file hash check passed.
[23:31:55] logfile size: 181538
[23:31:55] Leaving Run
[23:31:59] - Writing 49176798 bytes of core data to disk...
[23:31:59]   ... Done.
[23:32:09] - Shutting down core
[23:32:09] 
[23:32:09] Folding@home Core Shutdown: FINISHED_UNIT
[23:34:12] ***** Got an Activate signal (2)
[23:34:12] Killing all core threads

Folding@Home Client Shutdown.


--- Opening Log file [October 31 23:34:20] 


# SMP Client ##################################################################
###############################################################################

                       Folding@Home Client Version 6.02

                          http://folding.stanford.edu

###############################################################################
###############################################################################

Launch directory: /home/chris/folding
Executable: ./fah6
Arguments: -smp -verbosity 9 -oneunit 

[23:34:20] - Ask before connecting: No
[23:34:20] - User name: ChrissyT88 (Team 10)
[23:34:20] - User ID: 6863B6A61C0C450E
[23:34:20] - Machine ID: 1
[23:34:20] 
[23:34:20] Loaded queue successfully.
[23:34:20] - Autosending finished units...
[23:34:20] Trying to send all finished work units
[23:34:20] + No unsent completed units remaining.
[23:34:20] - Autosend completed
[23:34:20] 
[23:34:20] + Processing work unit
[23:34:20] Core required: FahCore_a2.exe
[23:34:20] Core found.
[23:34:20] Working on Unit 01 [October 31 23:34:20]
[23:34:20] + Working ...
[23:34:20] - Calling './mpiexec -np 4 -host 127.0.0.1 ./FahCore_a2.exe -dir work/ -suffix 01 -checkpoint 15 -verbose -lifeline 6449 -version 602'

[23:34:20] 
[23:34:20] *------------------------------*
[23:34:20] Folding@Home Gromacs SMP Core
[23:34:20] Version 2.01 (Wed Aug 13 13:11:25 PDT 2008)
[23:34:20] 
[23:34:20] Preparing to commence simulation
[23:34:20] - Ensuring status. Please wait.
[23:34:20] Files status OK
[23:34:20] 
[23:34:20] Project: 0 (Run 0, Clone 0, Gen 0)
[23:34:20] 
[23:34:20] Error: Could not write local file.  Exiting.
[23:34:20] - Shutting down core
[23:34:30] one 0, Gen 0)
[23:34:30] 
[23:34:30] Error: Could not write local file.  Exiting.
[23:34:30] - Shutting down core

The client now does not seem to be able to do anything (keeps repeating the bottom section of the code), which is a pain. I am loathed to delete the work folder etc since i have no idea if it sent the finished unit, or how i can solve this problem if it happens again. Any help would be greatly appreciated - im pretty new to this VMware thing!
 
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Welcome to the fun of Linux :D

Here's a couple of things to help you on your way. First of all, you'll possibly need a kill script to shutdown f@h. Make a blank text document somewhere (I keep this on the desktop) and insert this line into it: killall -s2 fah6

This will safely shutdown the folding@home client when you need to terminate it. It usually takes about 30 seconds to shutdown the threads, but if you want it shut down quicker or they hang, then this is how to kill the threads. Click on System, then Administration and then System Monitor. Depending on the core used, you'll see 1-4 instances of FahCore_A*.exe listed (* depends on if it's using Core A1 or A2). Right click on the process and click "Kill Process", it may take a couple of seconds to kill. You'll know when all threads are terminated something like this will be displayed in the terminal:
[0]0:Return code = 103
[0]1:Return code = 0, signaled with Killed
[0]2:Return code = 0, signaled with Quit
[0]3:Return code = 1


The shutdown script also needs to be made executable. To do this, either right click on the script and go to Properties, then Permissions and tick the box called "Allow executing file as a program" or from a terminal, navigate into the directory where the script is located and enter "chmod +x file_name".

The problem you have at present with it displaying "Project: 0 (Run 0, Clone 0, Gen 0)" is known to come up now and again. To fix this, follow the directions in this thread to resolve your problem.

Things should be working as you need from now :)
 
Thanks senture - ran qfix and everything seems fine (well, at leats the old unit was sent). Thanks for the shutdown script advice - i will look into it today.

Thanks again
 
Thanks senture - ran qfix and everything seems fine (well, at leats the old unit was sent). Thanks for the shutdown script advice - i will look into it today.

Thanks again

I see you're pulling out all the stops to increase your PPD. :cool:

Buy some more GPUs, I dare you. :D
 
Well, i have been trying to run the winSMP client at the weekends (really, its the only time its on lots), but unfortunately it has given me nothing but problems, so i thought i would try the linux smp client, which seems altogether a lot better! Not really sure i could afford another gpu - i bought a GX2 (partially for gaming, mostly for folding!), so power sonsumption is pretty high, and im not sure its (morally... although...) a good idea to burn more electricity, and eat through me and my flatmates money. If i didnt have to sleep (or pay the leccy bill), i could (and would) be churning out 12.5K from this machine. But for now, I think your safe where you are...
 
Well, i have been trying to run the winSMP client at the weekends (really, its the only time its on lots), but unfortunately it has given me nothing but problems, so i thought i would try the linux smp client, which seems altogether a lot better! Not really sure i could afford another gpu - i bought a GX2 (partially for gaming, mostly for folding!), so power sonsumption is pretty high, and im not sure its (morally... although...) a good idea to burn more electricity, and eat through me and my flatmates money. If i didnt have to sleep (or pay the leccy bill), i could (and would) be churning out 12.5K from this machine. But for now, I think your safe where you are...

If it wasn't for the fact that i'm able to run a couple of my folding rigs in the lab at work (hence no leccy bill :) ) + some of the opteron servers in there i'd only be getting around 6000PPD from my home machine - I've been known to get bored quickly and give up though so you might get me back. :eek:
 
Good idea! I wish i had been into folding a few years ago when i was in halls - nice free electricity! To be honest, im sure it would only be a few pounds a week, even if it were on 24/7, but seeing the figures for a years usage etc is quite scary!
 
I see you're pulling out all the stops to increase your PPD. :cool:

Buy some more GPUs, I dare you. :D

hehehehe ... Already have :cool:

Work'en on this crazy Linux-WinDoze-GPU-CUDA-Wine (LWGCW) thing :confused:

ChrissyT88 said:
Well, i have been trying to run the winSMP client at the weekends (really, its the only time its on lots), but unfortunately it has given me nothing but problems, so i thought i would try the linux smp client, which seems altogether a lot better! Not really sure i could afford another gpu - i bought a GX2 (partially for gaming, mostly for folding!), so power sonsumption is pretty high, and im not sure its (morally... although...) a good idea to burn more electricity, and eat through me and my flatmates money. If i didnt have to sleep (or pay the leccy bill), i could (and would) be churning out 12.5K from this machine. But for now, I think your safe where you are...

I think Linux is by far the easiest to maintain / operate, not always to install and from my personal experience has been much more stable on the core / wu front.

In the past, i've had clients I've installed and never looked at again for weeks on end. I'm sure there were some EUE's in there somewhere, but it kept plugging along.
.
 
Nothing to do with linux, but saves a new thread. I have been manually setting the affinities of all the fah_core11s and the VMware executable in order to try and even out cpu core temperatures and to localise the vmware client onto two cores that share the same L2 cache. The only problem is that fah_core11 closes after every gpu WU has been completed, and starts again with a different affinity, and sits there doing nothing until i manually change the affinity (over the last two days, i reckon i have lost ~3hrs of gpu time). I have tried some affinity changing programs (set afinity II, prifinitty - both seem pretty good, but not quite what i am after), so have resorted to some batch files. They seem to work, but i've only ever written about 2 batch files ever, so wanted to check to make sure nothing was going to go wrong. Of course, if anyone wants to use the same scripts, feel free.

Code:
@echo off
echo Starting FAH GPU1
echo -------------------------------
echo.
set NV_FAH_CPU_AFFINITY=2
"C:\Folding@Home\GPU1\[email protected]"

I turned the 'affinity lock' variable off in the client config (and added parameters -gpu x -verbosity 9), and as i say, it seems to run. Just want to check to make sure it wont do any damage...

EDIT: I should add, to quit, im just using ctrl+c, and telling the batch script to end...
 
I just downloaded the VMware workstation trial to see if it was much different, and im amazed at how much better it is than the free server version! Its so much smoother/generally quicker, and doesnt seem to be using any additional cpu resources. It almost makes me want to shell out and pay for it... if it wasnt $189! :eek:
 
I prefer virtual box from Sun to VMware and virtual box is a free download

EDIT: I've just realised that VirtualBox needs a 64bit host OS in order to run a 64bit VM :(
 
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I agree - i have tried them both, and virtual box is much better than the free version of vmware, and feels pretty smooth like the paid for version of VMware. The reason i have not been using virtualbox is that it lacks multi 'virtual' processor support, which i thought was required for the SMP client. Can you run an SMP client on a virtualbox virtual machine? If so, i'll be ditching VMware when this free trial runs out!
 
You need to run a 64bit Linux OS inside your VM to run SMP folding. If you are running a 32bit host OS you can't do this with virtual box (see my comment above).

In other words I'm running 32bit XP pro at the moment so I'm screwed. If you are running XP 64bit or Vista 64bit you'll be ok.
 
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