I always bring this up when I meet people who like to volunteer/donate/improve the world, and since I haven't found anything on the board about it, I figured - why not?
Volunteer Computing (also known as Distributed Computing) is a method that makes very complex calculations and simulations possible by linking thousands of computers around the world. There are only very few supercomputers in the world (each cost over a hundred million dollars to build) and most are not only slower than a distributed computing network, but also fully booked for months. Many worthy research tasks and not nearly enough processing power. Distributed Computing became popular back in 1999 with the first project - SETI@Home - which analyzed data (and still does!) from space telescopes looking for possible signals from ET. Since then, projects have become a little more... shall we say productive.
Applications are in diverse subjects from biology, physics, chemistry and math. There are currently over 250,000 active participants and over 400,000 active computers.
The principle is simple: A very large and complicated task is broken up into small steps, known as workunits. These workunits are then distributed to the participants, whose computers solve them and return the result to the server. There they are recombined and analyzed by the researchers.
One does not have to be good with computers to take part, it's very simple to set up.
You simply download and install the BOINC software (Berkeley's Open Infrastructure Networking Client), select the project you want to support and your computer will be put to work. The software, as well as a list of projects, is available on the official website:
http://boinc.berkeley.edu/ (reminder: employers and schools don't like anyone installing software on their machines, so only sign up with your home computer or make sure you have permission!)
Running BOINC will not slow down your computer. It runs on the lowest priority, so as soon as you start a program it will slow down and free up the resources. Most programs barely use any processing power. If you look at your task manager (ctrl + alt + del on windows), you'll see a "System Idle Process" - this is the part of your computer (likely over 95%) that is doing nothing and could be put to good use
I think the biggest real life application so far was made at LHC@Home (currently not active) - it determined the calibration for huge magnets at CERN, the european center for nuclear research that brought you the Internet. (appropriate that they get some use out of it, too!
) Their experiment is scheduled to go live this spring and scientists hope to learn much more about particle physics and even discover a new particle that theories predict
should be there!
Volunteer Computing has some of the same elements that Kiva has: people from all over the world join forces to solve problems. While our individual contributions (financially or through our computers) is very small, the combined impact can achieve something much bigger.
Hopefully that wasn't too long and some of you decide to give it a shot. If there are any questions, please don't hesitate to ask! Specific questions to the research of a project can be asked on their forums, where the scientists behind it usually post frequently as well.
