Replacing Entropia's primenet server

[Kevin]

When I posted that, I was under the impression that no-net boxes would use the internet form, and get work from George, not from the server. I didn't realize that people would use one computer to have Primenet reserve exponents for a bunch of them. I never condone poaching (anymore), and didn't even bother with it then. My concern before was with making sure that all the one's below certain milestones were completed, and that problem is being dealt with on its own.

[Prime95]

Originally Posted by Joe O

So the fact that a person could be working on an exponent and someone else poaches it is not frowned upon?

Poaching is definitely frowned upon. You'll see this from a couple of heated discussions on the Mersenne mailing list the last two years.

In version 16, prime95 did not check in every 28 days. Thus, a user on a slow computer could get an exponent and tell the server it would take 2 years. If the user gave up, the server would not recycle the exponent for 2 years + 60 days!! Some users frustrated by this poached.

Now that the client must check in every 28 days, there is no need to poach. The server will know in a timely manner if an exponent is not being worked on.

I cannot stop poaching. It can happen either willfully or through ignorance. Even a very slow Pentium can complete a double-check in four months, so as long as your computer is running prime95 24 hours a day you should rarely be the victim of a poacher.

[Joe O]

Originally Posted by Prime95

I cannot stop poaching. It can happen either willfully or through ignorance.

Yes, you can! Don't give credit to a poacher. You already subtract credit if an LL is shown to be wrong. Subtract the credit for a poacher. If they find a factor remove their name from it. If they find a prime, do what the do in the university for a plagarizer. Don't give them credit. Make it a published policy, part of the "terms of agreement" for using Prime95. Publish the names of the flagrant offendors. The stocks worked!

Joe O.

[Prime95]

We can discourage poaching, but we can't stop it.

I agree CPU credit should not be given. Perhaps the new server can keep track of each users poaching activity and email them or cancel their accounts. I like the idea of some verbiage in the license.

We must also be careful to differentiate between a malicious poacher and the occasional result submitted after a reservation expires.

With money on the line if a prime is found, we'll need to tread extra carefully to avoid trouble in today's litigious society. At present there is a clause saying GIMPS is not responsible if someone finds a prime and you had the exponent reserved (that is, the poacher gets the credit/money).

This needs to be discussed further, I hereby appoint you the person to make sure we don't drop the ball on this issue when the new server is coded.

[garo]

[code:1]We must also be careful to differentiate between a malicious poacher and the occasional result submitted after a reservation expires.
[/code:1]

George has a point there. Sometimes poaching is inadvertant. As in, for some reason my box didn't update with the server and the exponent assigned to it expired while I was working on it. Then it got assigned to you. But I returned a result before you did. So poaching is not completely avoidable. But as George mentions there are ways to discourage out and out poachers. Those of us who have been looking at the milestones closely, such as dswanson, trif, daran and myself know the folks who still regularly poach and can name them and have evidence in the form of status reports and results.

But you also have to admit that sometimes you lose exponents inadvertantly too.

[Joe O]

I thought I had made it clear, that I thought not all "poaching" was deliberate. Rereading my posts I see that I have not done so. Yes, mistakes, glitches, "burps" happen. That is one reason that I said "only flagrant poachers names should be published." There is no reason to embarass someone for something that they didn't mean to do, or didn't really do because the server had problems.
The problem, as I see it, is that George needs an automated mechanism (which he can overide, if he so chooses) to detect poachers and deny them CPU credit. If this can be done in a way that allows the first timers to get credit, then all the better. If this can not be done, and everyone who reports on an unreserved exponent is denied credit, then there will have to be an appeal process. Hopefully, this will not happen too often, and George can handle the few emails that will ensue.
Does anyone already have an automated way of checking for "unreserved results"? This has to be an automated easy process so as not to burden George any more than he already is. If no one has such a process, is anyone willing to design one? If not, I'm willing to give it a go.

[Xyzzy]

I really doubt that a poacher is poaching to get credit for CPU years, so penalizing them by denying them credit might not be effective... I used to really get riled up about poaching, but it doesn't bother me much anymore... If you stick with ordinary exponents and get the work done in a reasonable amount of time, you have nothing to worry about... If you are "manipulating" the system to get low exponents to put onto slow boxes, you just might have problems... I'm not saying you can't use slow boxes for GIMPS, just that maybe a double check in the regular range, though more time-consuming, might be your best bet...

[Joe O]

Originally Posted by Xyzzy

If you are "manipulating" the system to get low exponents to put onto slow boxes, you just might have problems....

I'm not "manipulating the system". I'm just trying to do trial factoring on a nonet box that is actually faster than the net box (AMD K6III/400) that I used to get the assignments, 2 1/4 times faster as a matter of fact. There is no other way to get trial factors. I don't think that the nonet box is fast enough for double checks. It is a dual Celeron/450. I am doing double checks on my other net box a PIII/500 and that is slow enough for me, thank you. When I finish the 2 exponents that it has, I will probably go to trial factors on it as well.

Originally Posted by Xyzzy

I'm not saying you can't use slow boxes for GIMPS

I hope not.

Joe.

[Xyzzy]

Joe-

I didn't mean you in particular... :)

The majority of poachings occur when people pull recently released exponents at 0601UTC... Since these exponents are smaller, they are a bit more desirable for older computers... But sometimes these exponents are "hot", in that they are part of a few that need to be finished up for a milestone to get completed, so they are frequently poached...

[dswanson]

Since garo mentioned my name, I thought I'd chip in my $0.02. Without naming names, I've spotted three different poaching strategies in the low doublechecks (which I qualify as any exponent less than (probable) M38, 6972593).

Poacher 1 keeps a close eye on the days-to-expired value in the status report, and poaches only those numbers that are within a couple of days of expiring. This poacher returns the result usually within a day or two before the exponent expires, but occasionally misses and turns it in a bit after it expires (I once lost half a P4-day of work to this when a result was returned for my newly-assigned exponent :( ). This strategy stretches the rules a bit, but probably does little harm because the exponents most likely would expire anyway. It also prevents small exponents from rolling over to someone else who may either complete them slowly or not at all. Because of this strategy, no exponent less than 7M has actually expired in the past month or so. So those of us who specialize in grabbing and completing small exponents as they expire have been out of luck.

Poacher 2 also watches the status report, but poaches those numbers that have been assigned for a long period of time (days-run usually in excess of 300) and still have a long time to go (days-to-go usually in excess of 200). This strategy is less ethical, but I can certainly see the temptation if your goal is to prove M38 as quickly as possible.

Poacher(s) 3 simply grabs whatever looks interesting. I recently saw one exponent which the assignee had been working on for several hundred days (and reporting in regularly with slow but steady progress) get poached when it was within 7 days of being completed. This is the kind of behavior that can rapidly drive legitimate participants away from a DC project .

Another observation is that the poaching is escalating as we get closer to proving M38. Poacher 1 started in midsummer when we still had 300+ exponents to go. Poacher 2 was very busy in September, but lately seems to have run out of numbers that meet his criteria. Poacher(s) 3 have been at work for the past few weeks. I expect that once M38 is proven, the poaching will drop way off.

I haven't been watching the low first-times as closely, so I don't know if there is similar behavior going on there. I suspect not, since we're not really close to any significant milestone there.

[Joe O]

DSwanson, Thank you for your very informative post. I hesitate to disagree with you but I must to some extent. All poaching does harm, all poaching is unethical, all poaching is cheating, all poaching will drive legitimate participants away!
People are leaving SETI because of the widespread cheating. Many are stating that the only thing worse than the cheating is the fact that the sponsors refuse to do anything about it!
I get very worried when I read

I used to really get riled up about poaching, but it doesn't bother me much anymore.

Complacancy is the first step on the road to disaster. The next step is "Well everyone else is doing it, why shouldn't I do it too!"

Originally Posted by dswanson

This strategy stretches the rules a bit, but probably does little harm because the exponents most likely would expire anyway.

This strategy is less ethical, but I can certainly see the temptation if your goal is to prove M38 as quickly as possible.

This is the kind of behavior that can rapidly drive legitimate participants away from a DC project .

Another observation is that the poaching is escalating as we get closer to proving M38.

Again, by poaching I mean the deliberate stealing of an exponent assigned to someone else. I do not mean the cases where the server "burps" and doubly assigns work, or any other circumstances where someone inadvertantly works on an exponent assigned to someone else.

Joe.