BOINC
BOINC is an open-source software platform for volunteer computing. It allows people to donate their personal computing power to scientific research projects in fields like medicine, biology, astronomy, and more.
volunteer-computing
citizen-science
grid-computing
scientific-research
BOINC: Open-Source Volunteer Computing Platform
Open-source software platform for volunteer computing, allowing users to donate their personal computing power to scientific research projects in various fields.
What is BOINC?
BOINC (Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing) is an open source software platform for distributed computing, which utilizes the unused processing power of personal computers owned by volunteers. It allows ordinary people to donate their spare computing power to help scientists solve important research problems in various fields such as medicine, biology, astronomy, climate study, and more.
With BOINC, scientists can set up projects that tap into a virtual supercomputer comprised of thousands or even millions of volunteered personal computers across the world. It installs a small program that runs automatically in the background whenever the volunteer's computer is idle, using its spare CPU or GPU cycles to crunch numbers or perform calculations. The results are sent back to the research lab. Anyone can participate by simply downloading the BOINC software.
BOINC has been instrumental in democratizing science and allowing ordinary citizens to contribute meaningfully to important research efforts and scientific discovery. Over its lifetime, the BOINC community has contributed an enormous amount of computing power that even exceeds those of the world's fastest supercomputers. Today, a number of major universities and science organizations use BOINC for their distributed computing needs across diverse research areas.
BOINC Features
Features
- Volunteer computing platform
- Allows users to donate spare computing power
- Supports various scientific research projects
- Open source software
Pricing
- Open Source
Pros
Contribute to advancements in science and research
Make use of spare computing resources
Many projects to choose from based on your interests
Free and open source software
Cons
Can slow down your computer when running
Some projects may not interest all users
Requires technical knowledge to set up and use
Official Links
The Best BOINC Alternatives
Top Science & Research and Distributed Computing and other similar apps like BOINC
Here are some alternatives to BOINC:
Suggest an alternative ❐
Folding@home
Folding@home is a distributed computing project launched in 2000 by Vijay Pande and colleagues at Stanford University. It harnesses the unused processing power of personal computers owned by volunteers to simulate protein folding, computationally intensive molecular dynamics simulations of protein folding and misfolding.The simulations run when a person's computer would...
CryptoBullions Folding Pool
CryptoBullions Folding Pool is a cryptocurrency mining pool service that utilizes the computing power of users' devices to help advance medical and scientific research through the Folding@home distributed computing project. Folding@home uses spare computing resources to simulate protein folding, computations that assist in developing new therapies for diseases like cancer,...
Charity Engine
Charity Engine is a user-friendly, cloud-based fundraising and donor management software designed specifically to help nonprofits and charities operate more efficiently and raise more funds. It provides an all-in-one platform to connect with donors, manage fundraising campaigns, accept donations online, communicate with supporters via email and social media, track results,...
Crowdcrafting
Crowdcrafting is an open-source crowdsourcing platform that enables defining, distributing and managing microtasks that require human intelligence to complete. It supports various types of microtasks such as image classification, image tagging, text transcription, text translation, geocoding, sentiment analysis, surveys and more.The platform is designed to connect requesters who need large...
Quantum Moves
Quantum Moves is an open-source software package for designing quantum control experiments. It allows researchers and students to construct pulse sequences that manipulate atomic and molecular systems on quantum computers or quantum simulators.Some key features of Quantum Moves include:Graphical user interface for building pulse sequences by dragging and dropping quantum...
PelicanHPC
PelicanHPC is an open-source workload manager and resource manager designed for high performance computing (HPC) clusters. It provides sophisticated scheduling algorithms to optimize job throughput and resource utilization across complex HPC workloads.Key features of PelicanHPC include:Advanced scheduler supporting backfill, fairshare, and priority based algorithmsIntegrated node, job, and reservation monitoringSupport for...
JPPF
JPPF is an open source distributed computing framework written in Java. It provides a simple API and software components that enable developers to parallelize execution of tasks across multiple machines, cores and clusters.Some key capabilities and benefits of JPPF include:Automatic partitioning and distribution of tasks across a network of computing...
GridRepublic
GridRepublic is a cloud computing platform designed for running high-performance, compute-intensive workloads. It works by aggregating spare computing capacity from edge devices and data centers into a unified resource pool.Some key features of GridRepublic include:On-demand access to cloud-based high-performance computing resources for running simulations, AI/ML workloads, rendering, financial modeling, and...
Progress Thru Processors
Progress Thru Processors is a low-code application development platform designed to help organizations quickly create business applications. With a visual, drag-and-drop interface, Progress Thru Processors enables developers and non-developers alike to build web and mobile apps faster with minimal hand-coding required.Key features and capabilities include:Intuitive visual development environment for assembling...
Pybossa
Pybossa is an open-source crowdsourcing framework written in Python that enables users to create and manage crowdsourcing projects. It allows you to leverage human intelligence to perform tasks that are difficult for computers, such as image labeling, classification, transcription, geocoding, and more.Some key features of Pybossa include:Simple creation of microtasks...
Distri.js
Distri.js is an open-source JavaScript framework for building distributed web applications. It allows developers to create peer-to-peer architectures rather than relying on centralized servers.Some of the key capabilities of Distri.js include:Peer-to-peer networking - It handles connecting web browsers together into a mesh network for sharing data and communicating directly without...
PiCloud
PiCloud is a platform that provides on-demand access to a scalable cloud computing infrastructure for running Python code and applications. It aims to make cloud computing more accessible for scientific computing and data analysis.Some key features of PiCloud include:Automated parallelization and distribution of Python code across a cluster of machinesA...
HFM-NET
HFM-NET is an open source financial corporate performance management (CPM) application built on the .NET platform. It provides capabilities for financial consolidation, planning, reporting and analytics.Key features of HFM-NET include:Multi-GAAP and multi-currency consolidationWorkflow and task managementFinancial and management reportingBudgeting and forecastingAnalytics and dashboardsHFM-NET offers similar functionality to commercial solutions like...
