John seems to have a fleet of old slow computers as well ... I am pretty sure Jack at Collatz has a reference machine at that project as well ...
But the bottom line is that if you do set-up the calibration and get the data then the dependence on the primary references can be broken (with a minor loss of accuracy) by substituting a later generation machine. In that, contrary to rumor, the interest is in getting a stable and reasonably accurate system ... not a perfect system that 100 years from now we can prove a deviation of 0.0000001% or less ... If there was one weakness in the proposal I put up was that I did not do the part that Dr. Anderson did in his ... in part because I couldn't get anyone to read the base proposal, adding in obtuse math would not have made it more attractive. But the core of what he suggested is pretty much what I had in mind ... On Sep 29, 2009, at 10:09 AM, Martin wrote: > Martin wrote: > [...] >> The main aim is to eliminate the need for adding extra code into the >> clients just for the sake of adding up FLOPS or IOPS or whatever. >> Further, the aim is to also eliminate the need for adding /any/ >> 'performance instrumentation' into the clients. (Optimisations are >> inherently allowed for also.) >> >> Referencing back to known hardware looks to be a lot easier, and also >> offers the chance to be "scientific" about the credits. We can then >> do >> meaningful performance comparisons for hardware, algorithms, or >> whatever... Who knows what new Computer Science can be then >> uncovered. >> >> The credits freaks then also get a 'currency' that is stable and >> referenced back to known hardware/performance. >> >> Better still, all the calibration can be coordinated purely server- >> side. >> >> Just eliminating all the arguments and extended discussions has >> just got >> to be a good plus point! :-) > > A further thought... > > The calibration can easily be used with the present "Cobblestones" > scheme. Hence, the server-side development should be relatively easy > (sorry, bad pun :-) ) and be able to be rapidly put in place, and not > upset the present credits scheme. > > The old CPDN lab machine mentioned earlier that is still running could > form a starting point as a calibration reference. > > Note: That will not solve the problem of trying to credit for what the > cobblestones do not even measure. I guess that non-FLOPS projects will > continue to have to add up a few fictitious pseudo-FLOPS! > > > At a later date, once all the discussion for a new credits scheme has > been discussed, the /same/ calibration scheme should work just the > same > for whatever credits and whatever resources are measured, provided > that > we reference against representative system hardware for calibrating > whatever mix of resources are being credited. > > (Apologies if the long sentence breaks the Google translator :-( ) > > > In brief: The calibration scheme should work just the same for any > credits scheme. You just need your "etalon"(*) computer to be suitably > representative for all of the mix of resources being referenced. > > > Regards, > Martin > > * I'm guessing that Raistmer's Russian <--> English translation of > "etalon" means "reference-comparison device", just as for an etalon in > an interferometer. > > > -- > -------------------- > Martin Lomas > m_boincdev ml1 co uk.ddSPAM.dd > -------------------- > _______________________________________________ > boinc_dev mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.ssl.berkeley.edu/mailman/listinfo/boinc_dev > To unsubscribe, visit the above URL and > (near bottom of page) enter your email address. _______________________________________________ boinc_dev mailing list [email protected] http://lists.ssl.berkeley.edu/mailman/listinfo/boinc_dev To unsubscribe, visit the above URL and (near bottom of page) enter your email address.
