Bug#365582: wishlist: nice and graphics

[Gordon Haverland]

Package: boinc-client
Version: 5.4.3-1
Severity: wishlist


The mechanism by which the boinc-client(s) applications runs is
a little coarse grained.  If a person used their computer interactively
at nearly 100% usage, and then left it alone for long periods (compared
to 3 minutes or whatever), then the boinc-client would probably working
about as well as could be expected.  But, if I am using my computer
(with dual CPUs) in such a way that the only interaction I have with
the computer is with a mouse, I can have both CPUs sitting at 100%
usage, two boinc-clients getting most of that CPU usage, and still see
acceptable performance.  But the moment I touch the keyboard, the
boinc-client detects a "user" is present, unloads the application,
and CPU usage slips to 10% or less.  Wouldn't it be better to
just "nice" the program and let the scheduler deal with allocation
cycles?

I've tried a few times to get graphics (setiathome), and looked for
HOWTOs on the Internet.  So far, the only thing I can see is a plot
of my work done over time, which is almost a straight line.  Not
very exciting that plot.  :-)  It would be nice if there was an
easy/reliable way to see the statistics of what I am doing, like the
pre-boinc setiathome client.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell:  /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.16
Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C (charmap=ANSI_X3.4-1968)

Versions of packages boinc-client depends on:
ii  adduser       3.87                       Add and remove users and groups
ii  libc6         2.3.6-7                    GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  libcomerr2    1.38+1.39-WIP-2006.04.09-1 common error description library
ii  libcurl3      7.15.3-1                   Multi-protocol file transfer libra
ii  libgcc1       1:4.1.0-1+b1               GCC support library
ii  libidn11      0.5.18-2                   GNU libidn library, implementation
ii  libkrb53      1.4.3-7                    MIT Kerberos runtime libraries
ii  libssl0.9.8   0.9.8a-8                   SSL shared libraries
ii  libstdc++6    4.1.0-1+b1                 The GNU Standard C++ Library v3
ii  lsb-base      3.1-5                      Linux Standard Base 3.1 init scrip
ii  python2.4     2.4.3-3                    An interactive high-level object-o
ii  zlib1g        1:1.2.3-11                 compression library - runtime

boinc-client recommends no packages.

-- no debconf information