Mlucas version 17.1

[ewmayer]

Thanks to Alex Vong, who earlier this year spurred me to help him with a proposed Linux packaging of the code (Debian first, after which we shall see about other distros), we now have a beta version of a standard Linux-style automated build-tools setup. Feedback from human guinea pigs beta testers appreciated - details at top of the 'News' section of the usual online README page. (And please let me know if the description there could be improved.)

[LaurV]

Nitpicking:
The page is misleading in 2 places:
1. You should specify in the beginning the fact that the program is slower than P95, and "if you have windoze and intel cpu and you can run p95, then do so!". You specify that your program is intended for non-P95 users, but it is not transparent why (until reading much down, there is a comment about versioning where it specifies why you stop and resume the versioning numbers, and there you say something about speed).
2. Where you say about MLucas having no factoring abilities you suggest that the user who got a "not enough factored" assignment to use P95 to TF to the optimum limit. We know today that this is extremely inefficient, you should point the user to GPU factoring (possibly mfaktX and GPU72).

[ewmayer]

Originally Posted by LaurV

Nitpicking:
The page is misleading in 2 places:
1. You should specify in the beginning the fact that the program is slower than P95, and "if you have windoze and intel cpu and you can run p95, then do so!". You specify that your program is intended for non-P95 users, but it is not transparent why (until reading much down, there is a comment about versioning where it specifies why you stop and resume the versioning numbers, and there you say something about speed).
2. Where you say about MLucas having no factoring abilities you suggest that the user who got a "not enough factored" assignment to use P95 to TF to the optimum limit. We know today that this is extremely inefficient, you should point the user to GPU factoring (possibly mfaktX and GPU72).

Thanks, LaurV:

I actually told Alex to include just such a note re. 'slower than P95' in his manpage:

Mlucas is an open-source program for primality testing of Mersenne numbers in search of a world-record prime.
You may use it to test any suitable number as you wish, but it is preferable that you do so in a coordinated fashion,
as part of the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS). For more information on GIMPS, see the Great Internet
Mersenne Prime Search subsection within the NOTES section and SEE ALSO section. Note that Mlucas is not (yet)
as efficient as the main GIMPS client, George Woltman's Prime95 program (a.k.a. mprime for the linux version), but
that program is not truly open-source, and requires the user to abide by the prize-sharing rules set by its author, should
a user be lucky enough to find a new prime eligible for one of the monetary prizes offered by the Electronic Freedom Foundation.

But I neglected to add similar comments to the README.html updates. Will do, and also update the out-of-date P95-for-TF note. Is there a central link I can include for GPU-TF info, for all the various clients and OSes?

[ewmayer]

Updated README.html posted, which also adds a link to the GPU72 homepage.

[ATH]

Did anyone try to build Mlucas in Windows on MSYS/MSYS2 with Mingw64 ?

The site appears to be down? http://hogranch.com/mayer/README.html

[ewmayer]

Originally Posted by ATH

Did anyone try to build Mlucas in Windows on MSYS/MSYS2 with Mingw64 ?

The site appears to be down? http://hogranch.com/mayer/README.html

Yah, I just noticed that as well - note whois shows no contact info, found the domain owner John Pierce's old e-mail [last name AT the same oinkish domain] in one of my saved online address books, as I note I hope he has his e-mail to the hogranch.com address aliased to some other newer address:

Begin forwarded message:

From: "E. Mayer"
Date: January 13, 2016 4:10:21 PM PST
To: ************
Subject: hogranch.com down?

Hi, John:

Trying to reach you by the only e-mail I have for you ... which will fail if the hogranch.com server also handles your e-mail - anyhoo, hogranch.com appears to be down at the moment. I used my account there to stash some Mersenne-related stuff a few hours ago, went to do a few other cleanups just now, no go - ping also reports 100% packet loss.

Hoping you have this e-mail aliased to at least one other account!

Cheers,
-Ernst

Edit: Just heard back from John, who thankfully does not use his ftp server to also handle his e-mail:

last week, my landline and DSL was nearly totally down for the better part of the week awaiting AT&T service, who finally came saturday, and moved my trunk onto a different pair in the cable.

it appears I'm still getting packet loss and the landline is hissy/staticy, so this pair has issues too, and I believe the telco guy said there aren't any more working pairs in the trunk on the street here, so if it goes down again, they'll need to pull a whole new trunk from the RT box 1/2 mile down the hill. ugh.

I do have a alternate email, **** but I don't check it as often as I should because I have it forwarding to [above 'oink' address]

I should move your stuff that's on hogranch.com to my /real/ server, freescruz.com ... this is colocated at a real ISP and is just all around a better server.

I ftp'ed in successfully, but 'get' of a sample file ended up hanging ... likely due to same issue he describes. Anyone who wants the latest release but fails to get it at the official ftp site, PM or e-mail me and I'll gladly provide you a copy.

[ewmayer]

More from John regarding housing those bits, I sked "Would the migration you propose allow the URLs to remain intact?", his reply:

if you're using hogranch.com/..... then no, it would be freescruz.com/..... if you're using a DNS alias, then we can point that to the new server. its been SO long since I set this up, hah, I don't remember what all you'er doing and kinda forgot you were even there :)

I'm trying to transfer your files now, and having problems going out the DSL, so what I think I need to do is move them to my PC over my LAN, then use my cable (yes, I have two internets here now!) to move them to freescruz

[a few minutes later]

oh. I see a link to anonymous FTP in your directory? I've killed off using ftp entirely on new.freescruz.com, we'd have to switch to http rather than ftp access for that. already onto phase two of the 2-step I just described, copied hogranch.com -> PC locally, and am now copying PC -> new.freescruz.com. your user account should be active on new.freescruz.com, password is copied straight across (its hashed so I dunno what it is).

Suggestions re. link-rot-resistant web-hosting, URLs, etc, appreciated.

[Batalov]

Mike has an excellent record of keeping mersenneforum.org up, together with a long list of passengers:
http://mersenneforum.org/mmff-gfn/
http://mersenneforum.org/mmff/
http://mersenneforum.org/mfaktc/ and on and on (and of course the mirror of
http://mersenneforum.org/gimps/ )

[ewmayer]

Originally Posted by Batalov

Mike has an excellent record of keeping mersenneforum.org up, together with a long list of passengers:
http://mersenneforum.org/mmff-gfn/
http://mersenneforum.org/mmff/
http://mersenneforum.org/mfaktc/ and on and on (and of course the mirror of
http://mersenneforum.org/gimps/ )

Yes, that thought had occurred to me - my more immediate concern is to how do do such a move without every later user who tries to access one of the old pages getting a 404 error. I suppose I could replace all the html files on hogranch.com with a simple redirect-stub file, perhaps including a tasteful piece of adult erotica (of the sexy-but-non-sexist variety: We would use only shirtless Hoff-pics which also include at least one Baywatch fem-babe) or funny cat-animation for the user to watch while waiting to be redirected.

If you experience a redirection lasting 4 hours or more, contact your doctor.

[Mark Rose]

Originally Posted by ewmayer

Yes, that thought had occurred to me - my more immediate concern is to how do do such a move without every later user who tries to access one of the old pages getting a 404 error. I suppose I could replace all the html files on hogranch.com with a simple redirect-stub file, perhaps including a tasteful piece of adult erotica (of the sexy-but-non-sexist variety: We would use only shirtless Hoff-pics which also include at least one Baywatch fem-babe) or funny cat-animation for the user to watch while waiting to be redirected.

If you experience a redirection lasting 4 hours or more, contact your doctor.

[Xyzzy]

All Ernst needs to do is (consistently) use relative links instead of absolute links.

http://www.mersenneforum.org/mayer/