What is Gridcoin?
Gridcoin is a cryptocurrency that securely rewards BOINC computation on top of Proof of Stake. BOINC statistics are gathered directly from the whitelisted BOINC project servers & all nodes agree on a daily superblock containing verified team statistics.
Gridcoin related links
Twitter, Facebook, GitHub, Reddit, Cryptocointalk, IRC #Gridcoin, Soundcloud, YouTube, Tumblr, Coinmarketcap.
What is BOINC?
BOINC is an open-source volunteer oriented distributed computing grid. It's free, and harnesses the unused clock cycles from processors and graphics cards to attempt to cure cancer/aids/ebola/malaria, map the milkyway, fold proteins, search for extraterrestrial life, etc.
What are some examples of existing BOINC projects?
World Community Grid : Attempting to solve Cancer, Ebola, Malaria, Zika, etc
SETI@Home : Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI)
GPUGRID: Full-atom molecular simulations of proteins
Milkyway@home : Creation of a 3d map of the milkyway galaxy using data gathered by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. This project enables research in both astroinformatics and computer science.
Examples of more whitelisted projects
Who can make a BOINC project?
Anyone can create a BOINC project, there's no centralised authority that you are required to consult before creating a BOINC project. If you've got a good idea, go ahead and create it.
How can I make a BOINC project?
You could simplify project setup by using the BOINC Server Docker container.
Read this official (old) 'creating boinc projects' PDF guide to get an understanding of how to implement a boinc project. [VIRUSTOTAL SCAN: 0/53]
Look into the project creation cookbook to simplify the implementation of a BOINC project.
'Building BOINC and BOINC applications on linux' - October 2009
What are the benefits of a BOINC project over cloud computing?
Whitepapers on this topic
The cost of virtualization implementation in volunteer computing
Increasing GP Computing Power for Free via Desktop GRID Computing and Virtualization
Cost-Benefit Analysis
[PDF] Cost-Benefit Analysis of Cloud Computing versus Desktop Grids
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An extract from the above PDF:
We determined the cost-benefits of cloud computing versus volunteer computing applications. We calculated VC overheads for platform construction, application deployment, compute rates, and completion times. We found that in the best-case scenario, hosts register at a rate of 124 cloud nodes per day. We found that the ratio of volunteer nodes needed to achieve the compute power of a small EC2 instance is about 2.83 active volunteer hosts to 1.
What are the different possible categories of BOINC project?
Volunteer/non-profit
Scientists: Use BOINC to create a volunteer computing project.
Universities: Use BOINC to create a Virtual Campus Supercomputing Center.
Commercial/For-Profit
Companies: use BOINC for desktop Grid computing.
Create a commercial BOINC project (such as a video rendering project), charge customer and distribute pay to BOINC crunchers (with a small fee for the BOINC project to continue maintenance).
BOINC DAC (Theoretical)
Create a BOINC decentralized autonomous company that anyone can profit from, and anyone can submit relevant work units towards for GRC.
You would need to investigate reducing the centralisation of the BOINC server to be categorised as decentralized. Additional development would be required to monetize a BOINC DAC potentially via a smart contract.
Related research
Optimizing the data distribution layer of BOINC with BitTorrent.
Attic: A Case Study for Distributing Data in BOINC Projects.
Extending the BOINC architecture using peer-to-peer application code exchange.
Golem Project.
Brainstorming new BOINC projects
We have an existing thread on cryptocointalk where we have discussed ideas for new projects.
Do you have an idea for a potential BOINC project, or do you have questions about either BOINC or Gridcoin? Reply below! You don't need to have the skills to implement the project, we want to hear all ideas! :)
Best regards,
CM.
