Setting up a single-host server

BOINC provides a set of scripts for setting up and controlling a BOINC server complex. These scripts require all the server components to run on a single host. This has been tested only on Linux and Solaris hosts; it may work with small modifications on Windows also.

The scripts can be used to create multiple BOINC projects on the same host. This can be handy for creating separate projects for testing and debugging. In fact, the scripts are part of a general testing framework that allows multiple developers to work independently on a single host, with each developer able to create multiple projects.

Install the following software on the server host:

MySQL, version 3.23 or later
PHP, version 4.2.3 or later
Apache, linked with the PHP module, POST enabled
Python, version 2.2 or later

Your operating system must have shared memory enabled, with a max shared segment size of at least 32 MB.

Creating the server

Run the make_project script; example command line:

    cd tools/
    ./make_project --base $HOME/boinc --url_base http://boink/ yah 'YETI @ Home' upper_case 'UpperCase'

See "make_project --help" for more command-line options available (such as finer control of directory structure or clobbering an existing installation).

The script does the following:

Create the project directory and its subdirectories.
Create the project's encryption keys if necessary. NOTE: before making the project publicly visible, you must move the code-signing private key to a highly secure (preferably non-networked) host, and delete it from the server host.
Create a MySQL database for this project, named (BOINC_USER_NAME)_(project-name).
Insert initial records in the project, platform, user, and app tables.
Copy cgi-programs to project/cgi-bin
Copy daemons to project/cgi
Copy html files to project/html_user and project/html_ops
Generate the configuration file (config.xml) used by the server programs.

Directory structure

Designate a "BOINC projects" directory on the server host. The scripts will create subdirectories as follows:

boinc_projects/
    proj1/
        config.xml
        bin/
        cgi-bin/
        log/
        pid/
        download/
        html_ops/
        html_user/
        keys/
        upload/
    proj2/
    ...

where proj1, proj2 etc. are the names of the projects you create. Each project directory contains:

config.xml: configuration file
bin: server daemons and programs, including the main start program as well as all the daemons
cgi-bin: cgi programs
log: log output
pid: lock files and pid files
download: storage for data server downloads.
html_ops: copies of PHP files for project management.
html_user: copies of PHP files for the public web site.
keys: encryption keys used by the project.
upload: storage for data server uploads.

When you run the make_project script it will give you lines to append to your Apache httpd.conf. (Basically you need to alias html_user, alias html_ops, and script-alias cgi-bin, all with appropriate directory permissions.)

You should also set the default MIME type as follows:

DefaultType application/octet-stream

At this point you hopefully have a functioning BOINC server, but it has no applications or work to distribute. The remaining steps to make a public project include:

Develop, debug and test your application.
Develop back-end systems for generating work and processing results.
Using the "add" utility, add application versions to the BOINC database.
Develop your web site.