TL;DR: MLC is entering an analysis phase, and new work will be bursty and inconsistent for at least the next few months. Please adjust your BOINC contributions accordingly!

Over the past several months we (MLC@Home admins) have turned our attention to the analysis of the results our volunteers have contributed. With the completion of DS1/2/3, and the partial results of DS4, we're really excited to polish up some papers and publish some results. (Along those lines, look for an announcement of availability of all 5 tiers of DS3 datasets later today or tomorrow, just need to set up a torrent for 1.3TB DS3-10000 dataset).

In addition, DS4 results are larger than we anticipated and also don't require as much computation time to complete. So when we release DS4 WUs our volunteers churn through them in only a few days time while also filling up the disk space on the server. This is a great problem to have, but also forces us to be judicious about sending out work to make sure we've archived enough old results off the server to handle the influx of new results.

The upshot of all this is that we don't have the resources to both do the analysis and prepare/maintain consistent meaningful work units. So rather that just keep pushing out work that'll keep WUs flowing but has less scientific meaning (such as creating more DS3 networks just to create a bigger dataset), we'd rather just announce that MLC@Home WUs work will be inconsistent for at least the next several months. We expect to release batches of DS4 WUs every few weeks, but it won't be the constant work availability you're used to from the project over the past two years.

We realize this will cause us to lose some volunteers, but that's why we're trying to be upfront about this now so that everyone can decide if and how to allocate their BOINC contributions accordingly. We hope that you'll consider leaving MLC in your projects list and help us crunch WUs when we have them, but understand if choose not to.

A few key things to note:

• Are you shutting down? . No, not at this time. Beyond the stated goals for DS4 above, we have some ideas where we would like to go in the future. But the main admin needs to spend time finishing up their thesis, so those plans will be on hold until after that is complete. If those plans don't come to fruition, then we will be up front here and actively shut down the project. We promise we won't just leave abandon it with no notice!
  
• What about all the work the volunteers have done? DS1/DS2 datasets are all available for download at https://www.mlcathome.org/mlds.html, and DS3 will be soon (via torrent). As DS4 completes we promise to make those available too at the same place.
  

We hope this announcement reassures you that we're trying to be good stewards of the trust and resources you provide us as BOINC volunteers. We're really excited by the science and humbled by your support since we started in July 2020, and we hope you understand as we move into the next phases of our work. As things change we'll make more announcements here and on our Discord.

-- The MLC@Home Admins(s)
Homepage: https://www.mlcathome.org/
Discord invite: https://discord.gg/BdE4PGpX2y
Twitter: @MLCHome2

Greatly appreciate the update, thank you.

We realize this will cause us to lose some volunteers, but that's why we're trying to be upfront about this now so that everyone can decide if and how to allocate their BOINC contributions accordingly. We hope that you'll consider leaving MLC in your projects list and help us crunch WUs when we have them, but understand if choose not to.

You don't know the patience of boinc volunteers :-P

We realize this will cause us to lose some volunteers, but that's why we're trying to be upfront about this now so that everyone can decide if and how to allocate their BOINC contributions accordingly. We hope that you'll consider leaving MLC in your projects list and help us crunch WUs when we have them, but understand if choose not to.

You don't know the patience of boinc volunteers :-P

+1

How do I cancel my account so it doesn't stay open? I don't care if this wipes my current 225,383 credits with MLC. Most projects have a cancel account link on the account page but I don't find it anywhere on yours.

I'm glad you gave folks a heads up but I'm not going to waste my time on yet another temporary project that isn't going to be actively running work units or one that doesn't keep up its forums and workloads. Sorry but not going to wait for someone to complete their college thesis.

Looks like this MLC is going to become another Mind Modeling or Orbit dead project refusing to call itself completed or dead year after year. Months or years of connection with only a few WUs or none.

Looked like an interesting project when I first saw it in Jan 2022. I joined a little before your announcement unfortunately. I am not willing to deal with any more temporary BOINC projects as I expect at least weekly and preferably constant work available from the projects I dedicate my cores to.

So can you explain how to cancel the account here so those of us who don't want to continue with MLC can safely close their accounts?

OK, I will add back my GTX 1650 Super. It isn't doing anything now anyway, and since MLC takes very little power, it is a good project for the summer.

This is one of the best projects I have ever seen for keeping the users informed. I just hope he hasn't wasted too much time on some people.
I worry when projects don't have enough work, but that is not the case here. The work isn't worth much without analysis.

I don't view any of the projects as just a means to keep my computer busy.

Any news on when the hiatus may be ending?

Never mind. I saw the shutdown notice come through on BOINC just now. I appreciate the heads-up. All the best to pianoman and volunteers. I enjoyed contributing to MLC while it was on - in fact it has been my favorite project.