21 May
1999
21 May
'99
9:58 a.m.
In a message dated 5/21/99 1:49:05 PM US Eastern Standard Time,
jim(a)calico.litterbox.com writes:
Here's a thought.
If you've got classic computers you'd love to run but can't think of
anything
to DO with them, (and they speak unix) go to
http://setiathome.ssi.berkeley.
edu
and make your computer's idle cycles part of the SETI search for
extraterrestrial life. They download you a chunk of data from the Arecebo
radio telescope and your computer spends its idle time running analysis on
that chunk, then sends the results back.
I believe distributed.net has a similar premise where just about any computer
could help crack some encryption algorithm.
They had client software for many operating systems including my favourite,
OS/2. Even xt based machines could help out by running dos based client
software.
david
21 May
21 May
10 a.m.
On Fri, 21 May 1999 SUPRDAVE(a)aol.com wrote:
I believe distributed.net has a similar premise where
just about any computer
could help crack some encryption algorithm.
Premise may be right. Has anyone proven that this provides faster results?
--Max Eskin (max82(a)surfree.com)
http://scivault.hypermart.net: Ignorance is Impotence - Knowledge is Power
24 May
24 May
4:45 a.m.
At 02:58 PM 5/21/99 EDT, SUPRDAVE(a)aol.com wrote:
I believe distributed.net has a similar premise where
just about any
computer
could help crack some encryption algorithm.
They had client software for many operating systems including my favourite,
OS/2. Even xt based machines could help out by running dos based client
software.
For the past year or so, I've been running their software on machines
that stay powered-on. I experimented with running the client on several
older machines, and it only served to remind me of the relative slowness
of the old machines. Ultimately, my frugal self said it wasn't worth
the $10 in electricity a month to leave an old computer on, when nearly
the same amount on a newer computer was delivering orders of magnitude
more computing power.
These internetworked computing projects are just a way for people to donate
the cost of electricity to the communal project. If nothing else, though,
the odds of winning the prize are probably better than your average
state lottery, at least in the case of cracking encrypted messages.
SETI is a different story.
- John
9187
days inactive
9190
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jfoust＠threedee.com -
max82＠surfree.com -
SUPRDAVE＠aol.com