I'm in the process of setting up a school competition for my physics class, but the computers we want to use in our lab are running deep freeze so that they reboot to the same image and nothing can be saved on them. My IT wants to know where BOINC writes/downloads so he can thaw that section and allow BOINC to continue working on reboot without having to unfreeze the whole computer. I know BOINC uses C:\Program Files\BOINC, but does it or any projects use anywhere else on the hard drive?

BOINC writes only to its BOINC folder. Project data like applications, input files, and output files are kept in BOINC\projects (one subfolder per project). Temporary data like checkpoints are kept in BOINC\slots (one subfolder per running workunit).

BOINC version 6 will keep only its own program files (like boinc.exe) on Program files, project data will be in a separate directory (configurable, as far as I know). This is for Vista compatibility.

Thanks. I think all our machines run Win XP Pro 2. I'll also need to be able to thaw the screen saver.

all screen savers are in the windows directory. (C:\windows\)

Thanks again to everyone.

Is there an official BOINC developers forum on which I could post questions? I want to make sure we setup everything to be thawed for BOINC, but not allow students to use the space to put other files. What I've got so for:

C:\Program Files\BOINC\ <-BOINC folder contains program and all projects.
C:\Windoes\BOINC <-BOINC screensaver

What registry changes are required?

A security tip: If somebody can read gui_rpc_auth.cfg on the BOINC directory, he could run programs on the machine, under the account where BOINC is running: by setting up a project, putting whatever he wants to run as the science app, and attaching to it on the lab machines (*). Without reading gui_rpc_auth, he won't be able to attach projects.


(*) Not easy, but hey it's still a security hole. Exploiting a buffer overflow would be harder

There are several places for this:
The semi-official BOINC forum
The developers mailing list
The official Wiki
The unofficial Wiki

Thanks Saenger. I'll look up info and/or ask questions in those places.

Thanks PovAddict. I'm not as concerned with the exploit you mentioned as I am with students using the BOINC folder to store games and images.

BTW, I found BOINC in the Registry:

My Computer
> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
> SOFTWARE
> Space Sciences Laboratory, U.C. Berkely
> BOINC Setup

I'll check the sites Saenger posted, but does anyone know of other changes BOINC makes in Win XP?