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World Community Grid Forums
Category: Support
Forum: Suggestions / Feedback
Thread: WCG and it's obscurity in East Texas. |
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Thread Status: Active Total posts in this thread: 8
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BearkatCruncher
Cruncher Joined: Jul 16, 2010 Post Count: 5 Status: Offline |
I'm a college sophomore at a fairly large (approx. 17,000) conventional state institution in East Texas -- Sam Houston State University. I can sit here and tell you folks that since finding out about WCG a year ago, nobody I know has heard of this site/project and only a very small few have heard of distributed/grid computing in general (the small number that do know of SETI). At times, though, I'm enthusiastic about this project and others (I have 4 desktops contributing to WCG and Rosetta@home), it gets tiring having to explain how all of this works.
----------------------------------------My father, a PhD'ed computer scientist and researcher for a Houston-based Fortune 500 (programs oilfield drilling equipment/tools), hasn't even heard of this initiative -- though he is definitely aware of grid computing, of course. Though, in fairness to him, I understand that CS is a very fast evolving field that even the biggest PhD'ed experts often have difficulty tracking. This is all in spite of the WCG IMHO being very relevant to the current aims of the State of Texas as it contains one of the US' (some say the world's) most renowned center of hospitals and medical research and Texas being BY FAR the US leader in renewable energy production. I feel IBM and its sponsors need to bring much more exposure to this project.  [Edit 4 times, last edit by BearkatCruncher at Nov 8, 2010 7:54:00 AM] |
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Richard Mitnick
Veteran Cruncher USA Joined: Feb 28, 2007 Post Count: 583 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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You will see a lot about WCG and other projects running BOINC at my blog, ScienceSprings , which I started out of the same exasperation as you express.
----------------------------------------Not just about WCG and BOINC; but rather the invisibility of the US contribution to scientific research of all kinds worldwide. Check out the blog. One of the highlights is the review of where around the world WCG and other BOINC projects are located. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Right!
We need to get the word to the high schools to get young students used to contributing computer time. Perhaps there is some way to target science teachers in a publicity campaign? Lawrence |
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Coleslaw
Veteran Cruncher USA Joined: Mar 29, 2007 Post Count: 1343 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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I would suggest talking to the Dean of the Dept. of Computer Science and see if he can get things moving. That would be the easiest way to get started. You never know...there might even be inclusion in some of the studies once the other professors are aware of it. If the Dean can get the memo out and possibly push to have it installed in the computer labs, that would be a good push.
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Richard Mitnick
Veteran Cruncher USA Joined: Feb 28, 2007 Post Count: 583 Status: Offline Project Badges:
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One note of caution, I happen to live in the town next to my university, a very large "research" institution where students are not allowed to run BOINC or any other distributed computing program because of bandwidth.
----------------------------------------Find out what is possible before lunging in. |
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kateiacy
Veteran Cruncher USA Joined: Jan 23, 2010 Post Count: 1027 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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I teach statistics at a research university. This past summer, I mentored a group of 4 undergrads in a biostatistics summer program. I had each of them start running WCG on their own laptops at the beginning of the summer, and at the end of the summer, they gave a presentation on volunteer computing at the workshop for students in similar programs across the state. The audience response was very positive.
----------------------------------------Every fall I teach a course in statistical computing for masters students. For the first time, this December I will be including a lecture on volunteer computing, with focus on World Community Grid. I'll let you know how it goes. I completely agree that getting young people involved is the way to grow volunteer computing research. Some of us faculty are trying!  mitrichr -- Your science blog is terrific. I've been sending the link to friends.  |
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Richard Mitnick
Veteran Cruncher USA Joined: Feb 28, 2007 Post Count: 583 Status: Offline Project Badges:
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kateiacy -
----------------------------------------Hey, thanks, I appreciate your vote of confidence. Another BOINC project, not in WCG, just asked to follow my Twitter page. So, you know, getting the word out is the best way to spread WCG and other BOINC projects. |
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BearkatCruncher
Cruncher Joined: Jul 16, 2010 Post Count: 5 Status: Offline |
One note of caution, I happen to live in the town next to my university, a very large "research" institution where students are not allowed to run BOINC or any other distributed computing program because of bandwidth. Find out what is possible before lunging in. Being involved with my university via campus organizations and having rubbed shoulders with my administration, I can say that my university wouldn't be receptive to this project running on university computers. This would be a very tough sell as it has been on a lot of other campuses I'm sure. However, I do run BOINC from my on-campus dorm where I'm free to roam and have unlimited power to boot. (The only restriction is that I'm limited to 5 PC's connected through my account). My university, which is serviced by AT&T (not sure what kind of OC line exactly) in my experience/opinion is very liberal when it comes to bandwidth usage. [Edit 1 times, last edit by BearkatCruncher at Nov 10, 2010 3:37:38 AM] |
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