I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

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I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby vikely » Tue Mar 22, 2011 11:05 am

Ok let me explain...Seti uses a screensaver we know that right.
Well I understand what's going on but does everyone..?.
To the average person who hasn't a clue about electronics or radiowaves its double dutch..nothing more than a pretty rotating colour display..I would encourage seti to make it simpler in appearance ..like for example remove background radiation..a single line going across the screen..( a bit like a heart monitor in a hospital.)..and then when when a high amplitude signal appears it shows as blip..etc and any intelligent type signal would raise an alarm to the user...surely this cannot be that hard to do not to mention the fact it would be faster by not using so much cpu resources.. :D

You have a good point about simplifying the screen and there is some validity to it. I also happen to know there are plenty of geeky users out there that would really like to see all the other data, my self included. But do we really need it to be flying and rotating through a star field??? I think not.

There are a couple of reasons that I can think of off the top of my head. Part of the problem with giving users an alarm when a signal is detected.

When users are sent packets of data there are at least two other users that get the same data. Each result from each user is then compared the other user's results to make sure they get the same data back. The reason for this is to prevent tampering and to verify the result for any possible processing errors.

If a signal is found, it's not like alarms would go off at Arecibo like you see in the movies. In actuality there are lots of potential candidates that need to be sorted through and rescanned, weed out ones that are probably just interference and such.

I honestly don't even use the screen saver. All text-based here. I don't see the point in wasting any CPU cycles on pretty graphics. I do my part and check the SETI@HOME site regularly for scientific updates. I would like to see a map of potential candidates like they used to do in the SETI@HOME Classic days. :D
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Re: I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby Aivars » Tue Mar 22, 2011 12:34 pm

Can I ask, why did you choose SETI over Folding?
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Re: I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby bitwise » Tue Mar 22, 2011 2:08 pm

Whit is "Folding"?
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Re: I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby Aivars » Tue Mar 22, 2011 3:00 pm

http://folding.stanford.edu/

"Our goal: to understand protein folding, misfolding, and related diseases"

"Folding@home is a distributed computing project -- people from throughout the world download and run software to band together to make one of the largest supercomputers in the world."

"Protein folding is linked to disease, such as Alzheimer's, ALS, Huntington's, Parkinson's disease, and many Cancers."
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Re: I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby bitwise » Tue Mar 22, 2011 11:10 pm

Speaking of distributed computing, you should add a feature to the new release that allows our screensavers to partner with Plura Processing so we can make money while the end user has their screensaver running.

Whatcha think?

http://www.pluraprocessing.com/desktopapps.html
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Re: I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby Aivars » Tue Mar 22, 2011 11:20 pm

That is the best idea of the month, I'll bring it up in the next meeting.

Update: but we won't add it to the very next version since we're in the finishing stages already.
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Re: I use seti@home but is it too complex for the layman

Postby Aivars » Tue Mar 29, 2011 8:01 pm

I got response from Plura and they have pretty high requirements regarding user base. You can contact me privately if you're interested.
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