I tried to create the $XDG directory structure for the "boinc" service user but I ended up breaking the whole install of boinc/podman that boinc didn't recognise that podman was installed anymore so it need a better linux sysadmin than me to workout how to do for the service account.

again no tasks available - what's going on over there ?

https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/result.php?resultid=433338163
Run time 3 days 13 hours 49 min 33 sec
CPU time 3 days 9 hours 20 min 23 sec
Priority 0
Validate state Valid
Credit 3,484.38

Well, it turns out I DID have to blacklist KVM.
Like this -

If it doesn't exist, create this file -sudo touch /etc/modprobe.d/kvm.conf
Edit kvm.conf and paste these lines -blacklist kvm blacklist kvm_intel blacklist kvm_amdand Save.

Update the GRUB configuration (if necessary):sudo grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfgReboot.

It works now. Thanks!

Bonjour,est ce que vous prévoyez d'optimiser encore l'application 302.1 theory ou est ce le modéle définitif parce que c'est lent avec docker.
ça va beaucoup plus vite sur virtualbox.

Hello, do you plan to further optimize the 302.1 theory application or is it the definitive model because it’s slow with docker.
it goes much faster on virtualbox.

It seems like if the proxy is localhost then it does not work but from the other computers its fine?
e,g, remote
https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/result.php?resultid=433002146
https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/result.php?resultid=433003508

Got a proxy from the local environment
Will use it for CVMFS and Frontier
Using CVMFS on the host.
Probing CVMFS repositories ...
Probing /cvmfs/alice.cern.ch... OK
Probing /cvmfs/cvmfs-config.cern.ch... OK
Probing /cvmfs/grid.cern.ch... OK
Probing /cvmfs/sft.cern.ch... OK
Excerpt from "cvmfs_config stat":
VERSION HOST PROXY
2.13.3.0 http://s1cern-cvmfs.openhtc.io http://192.168.1.179:3128

local

https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/result.php?resultid=433002036

Environment proxy 'http://192.168.1.179:3128' set but can't be connected
Could not find a local HTTP proxy

I changed it 127.0.0.1 on the local machine to see if it works.
also didn't work

Environment proxy 'http://127.0.0.1:3128' set but can't be connected
Could not find a local HTTP proxy

In reply to [TA]Assimilator1's message of 16 Feb 2026:
Thanks :), I see this for one task I have running :-

19300 events processed
19400 events processed
19500 events processed
19600 events processed

I assume it's still running then? Is there anywhere in that file that shows progress point?
Are the warnings anything to worry about?Don't worry about warnings as long as you see the number of events processed (slowly) increasing.
In the very first line of runRivet.log you see the job parameters. The penultimate number on that first line is how many events should be processed. Mostly 100,000 events.
Be aware that the task will not survive a system restart,

Two other jobs where I tested the cpu- and elapsed time difference when using VBox rather than docker for the same job:

pp bbbar 7000 20 - pythia8 8.313 default 100000 644 vbox: Run time 1 hours 18 min 2 sec CPU time 1 hours 16 min 34 sec docker: Run time 45 min 3 sec CPU time 38 min 16 sec
pp zinclusive 8000 -,-,100,170 - pythia8 8.306 tune-AU2m 100000 650 vbox: Run time 5 hours 7 min 54 sec CPU time 4 hours 57 min 50 sec docker: Run time 1 hours 54 min 10 sec CPU time 1 hours 40 min 49 sec

apres essais ,l'émulation linux pour docker me fais perdre environ 20% de performances globales sur mon pc en me basant sur les temps de calcul des autres projets non docker.C'est sans interet.autant resté sous linux.

after trying, the Linux emulation for docker makes me lose about 20% of overall performance on my PC based on the computation times of other non-docker projects. It is of no interest. as much remained under linux.

Cool, thanks for that last tip about the runRivet.log file. At least there I can keep an eye on it.
Very useful.



In reply to Crystal Pellet's message of 12 Feb 2026:
Yeah, Advice is ... let it run.
Theory tasks can run from 5 minutes to over 10 days, so don't look at the % done or remaining time. That's of no use.

The Show Graphics button is only available for VBox-tasks, not for the docker version.

I see your task is running in slot 0
In that slot is a folder named 'shared'.
In the shared folder is a file called 'runRivet.log'.
The process running in the container is writing the progress of the event processing into that file.[/quote]

In reply to Crystal Pellet's message of 9 Feb 2026:
Your i7-8700 can't make a connection to CERN:

Probing CVMFS repositories ...
Probing /cvmfs/alice.cern.ch... Failed!
Probing /cvmfs/cvmfs-config.cern.ch... Failed!
Probing /cvmfs/grid.cern.ch... Failed!
Probing /cvmfs/sft.cern.ch... Failed!
Probing CVMFS repositories failed

Thank you...

This workunit containing the job "boinc pp z1j 8000 - - sherpa 2.2.8 default 100000 500" starves because of EXIT_DISK_LIMIT_EXCEEDED
https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/workunit.php?wuid=238981772
The 20 hours running docker task with peak disk usage of 7.48 GB contains:

got abort request from client
running docker command: kill boinc__lhcathome.cern.ch_lhcathome__theory_2922-4899195-500_1
program: podman
command output:
boinc__lhcathome.cern.ch_lhcathome__theory_2922-4899195-500_1
EOM
.
.
.
stderr end
running docker command: container rm boinc__lhcathome.cern.ch_lhcathome__theory_2922-4899195-500_1
program: podman
command output:
boinc__lhcathome.cern.ch_lhcathome__theory_2922-4899195-500_1
EOM
running docker command: image rm boinc__lhcathome.cern.ch_lhcathome__theory_2922-4899195-500
program: podman
command output:
Untagged: localhost/boinc__lhcathome.cern.ch_lhcathome__theory_2922-4899195-500:latest
Deleted: 79376ef46d917bc296637af0b05b32bfd9343f28f7fbcb0b1de6c1c506d72d39
Deleted: 9259743e983aaef18ae52b23e457320fa4e849e4e352edb3ad1bd4eece38cec6
Deleted: a42a951158504bf9a4debe713e6aa7365d4651bd8f02aa676adef32a66e324da
Deleted: e06ed2ad55322792d5d90223aced1f2c12f101443f88bc2e586a122413c7ebe0
Deleted: c4f9331961caded74fc715fe1b0e5a576df596340e8a2d50385e0fbdc1cd9ea6

I aborted mine.

In reply to homer__simpsons's message of 6 Feb 2026:
Some of the tasks I received completed in less than 20 minutes, some took 2-6 hours (displaying at 99.987% or 100% for hours). This (21h+) is displaying at 100%.

The task: https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/result.php?resultid=432278682
The workunit: https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/workunit.php?wuid=238897618It is very usual when a Theory task is running for more than 1 day. Up to >10 days (very rare)
Your task with the herwig7 generator can last longer than 1 day. Let it run.
You may show the progress when using "Show Graphics" from BOINC Manager.
Highlight the running task and press the "Show Graphics" button. A local webpage will popup. Press the Logs link and then the running.log.

Most errors occur on the 670±1s
It's quite random

The Theory app is now available on Windows via the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). Documentation for the setup is available here, with Windows-specific instructions here.

TL;DR

1. Enable WSL
   
2. Install the BOINC WSL image
   

I missed cvmfs_config setup

When task duration exceeds certain limits, it is easy to get lost among thousands of seconds...
I made a simple spreadsheet for my own clarification.
It looks as follows:

Would the machine crash have caused the Theory task to completely restart?When a PC crashed and/or BOINC is not properly shutted down, VirtualBox is not able to save the VM-state to disk.
After BOINC-startup the task errors out or when you're lucky/unlucky, the VM is starting the job from the beginning.
The progress of the task in runRivet.log on disk is not updated any longer, but the progress can still be seen with BOINC Manager's "Show Graphics" .

BTW: https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/workunit.php?wuid=238232604 was a resend and the original client returned a valid result a bit too late. I would abort that task.

Your computer runs VirtualBox 5.2.20.
The Theory guest runs Linux kernel 5.14.
VirtualBox introduced initial support for kernel 5.14 (host and guest) with version 6.1.28.
https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Changelog-6.1