Troubleshooting

Troubleshooting

BOINC complains that VirtualBox is not installed, what to do?

Body

If you just want to run the Sixtrack application, you can safely ignore this message.  Otherwise, if you wish to run other applications like ATLAS, CMS or LHCb that require virtualization, you need to install Oracle Virtual Box as described in the "Install Virtual Box" entry. 

There is an issue with dependencies between VirtualBox and BOINC on some Linux distributions.

If you are running e.g. Ubuntu Linux, have already installed BOINC and VirtualBox, and still get a message from the BOINC client: VirtualLHC@home: Notice from server: VirtualBox is not installed 

To get the BOINC-VirtualBox combo to work properly on Ubuntu, please proceed as follows:

  • If not already done, install BOINC and VirtualBox from the Ubuntu repositories (with apt-get).  Then please execute:
  1. sudo service boinc-client stop 
  2. mkdir -p ${HOME}/boinc 
  3. boinc -dir ${HOME}/boinc 
  4.  boincmgr 

With this setup, the BOINC client puts all the temporary files in a directory called boinc under your home directory, and it is easy to see what is going on and avoid permission issues or similar.

Detailed question
BOINC client message: LHC@home: Notice from server: VirtualBox is not installed - What to do?

How do I report an error or a bug?

Body

If you have found an error or a bug in the application, the experiments, the project, etc. please write a post about the error in the message boards so the administrators and volunteers can participate in solving the problem.

Detailed question
How do I report an error or a bug?

VirtualBox crashes and does not respond at all to BOINC. What can I do?

Body

If the virtual machine named "boinc_wu_xxxx_..." in the VBox Manager window does not respond at all to BOINC (i.e. you suspend the BOINC task but the VM is still running) you can try the following steps to recover the project:

  1. Abort the running WU and exit BOINC. Then, you will have to manually kill or quit the VirtualBox process from a command line. It will be different in each operating system, but usually:
    1. In Mac OS X: you can kill it using the Terminal interface and running the kill -9 command to kill the PID of the process "VBoxHeadless.exe".
    2. In GNU/Linux: you can kill the VirtualBox process using your Desktop manager or from a terminal using the kill -9 command to kill the PID of the process called "VBox Headless".
    3. In Windows: open the Windows task manager and kill the VirtualBox process.
    4. Restart BOINC: it should receive a new clean WU and everything should be working OK again. If at this point you are still having problems, please use the message boards to get more help.
Detailed question
VirtualBox crashes and does not respond at all to BOINC. What can I do?

I'm getting lots of errors and I have BOINC installed as a service/daemon, is this a problem?

Body

BOINC must not be installed as a service (Windows) or a daemon (GNU/Linux) because this project uses Virtual Machines. When BOINC is installed as a service or a daemon it runs as an unprivileged user and cannot run any virtual machine.

The best solution to solve this problem under Windows is to install BOINC disabling the Service option in the Windows installer.

Late news: BOINC Client 7.2.10 and above solve this problem for running as a service under Windows.

For GNU/Linux users the recommendation is to use the official BOINC GNU/Linux installer instead of the packaged ones for your distribution.

Detailed question
I'm getting lots of errors and I have BOINC installed as a service/daemon, is this a problem?

I'm getting the following message: Computation Error output file absent. What can I do?

Body

First of all, HAVE YOU INSTALLED VirtualBox ??

Next, check that your BOINC installation sets up the correct permissions for running VirtualBox. Recheck our information on "Installing BOINC".

If BOINC is correctly installed, the main reason for that message is that the wrapper fails to remove an old virtual machine (VM) after it has expired, and so cannot register a new VM for the next Work Unit (WU).

The best solution for cleaning your project files if you have to do it manually is:

  1. Abort the running WU.
  2. Quit BOINC (the core client should be not running).
  3. Open VirtualBox Manager, and remove the registered machine named "BOINC_VM" (or any VM's with names "boinc_wu_xxxx_xxx").
  4. Open VirtualBox Media Manager and remove the cernvm.vmdk virtual hard disk if it is registered.
  5. Launch BOINC again.
Detailed question
I'm getting the following message: Computation Error output file absent. What can I do?

The Virtual Machine uses my CPU too intensively. How can I change this?

Body

You can change how much CPU time is used by the Virtual Machine going into your BOINC project account and changing the Preferences for this project -> Maximum CPU % for Virtual Machine. You can specify an amount between 0 and 100% (by default 100%), then save your preferences and update the BOINC project.

Detailed question
The Virtual Machine uses my CPU too intensively. How can I change this?

I installed BOINC in Windows with the "Protected Application Execution" option. Could this be a problem?

Body

If you have installed BOINC with the Protected Application Execution option enabled, then you will not be able to run the project, and all the work units will fail. The reason is that when you install BOINC with that flag enabled, BOINC is run under an unprivileged user that cannot create, start, pause, resume virtual machines at all. Thus, the wrapper will not be able to run the required virtual machine of this project.

In order to solve it, please, reinstall BOINC with that option disabled.

Detailed question
I installed BOINC in Windows with the "Protected Application Execution" option. Could this be a problem?

I'm using a Proxy for my Internet connections. Could this be a problem?

Body

If you only have access to Internet via a Proxy, you may get Compute Errors in BOINC, as the Virtual Machine needs direct connection to Internet. For the moment there is no solution, but we will try to fix it.

Detailed question
I'm using a Proxy for my Internet connections. Could this be a problem?

Message boxes keep popping up from Virtualbox. How can I remove them?

Body

VirtualBox warns the user about how the keyboard and mouse will be captured if you click inside the window of the virtual machine. This message will pop up everytime you run a virtual machine unless you tick the "don't show this window again" option in the message box.

Detailed question
Message boxes keep popping up from Virtualbox. How can I remove them?

My keyboard and mouse do not respond to me. How can I get them back?

Body

If you click inside the console window of the Virtual Machine and the keyboard and mouse get "grabbed" in the window, then to release them, you have to press the Host Key (Right Ctrl) or (Right Cmd in Mac OS X). You can check which is the Host Key by clicking in: File->Preferences->Input

Detailed question
My keyboard and mouse do not respond to me. How can I get them back?