<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0"><channel><title>Volunteer Computing News</title><link>https://www.vcnews.info/</link><description>Aggregated news from volunteer computing projects</description><pubDate>Mon, 2 Nov 2026 19:40:44 +0000</pubDate><lastBuildDate>Mon, 2 Nov 2026 19:40:44 +0000</lastBuildDate><item><title>[PrimeGrid] Lehmer's Birthday Challenge</title><link>https://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=16122</link><description><![CDATA[
From November 6 18:<b><u>00</u></b> to November 13 18:<b><u>00</u></b> PrimeGrid will be running a 7 day challenge on the Generalized Cullen/Woodall project. 

For more information, please see <a href="https://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=16121#191334" rel="nofollow">this forum thread</a>.
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 1 Nov 2026 06:26:46 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:30:https://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=16122</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] base S579 Megaprime and proven!</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2063</link><description><![CDATA[
Sightus@CAU, a member of the team Planet 3DNow! found a megaprime for base S579.<br />
The prime 6*579^725792+1 has 2.005.131 digits and entered the T5k PrimePages.<br />
The base S579 has been proven!<br />
<br />
This is the first find of the year
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 30 Oct 2026 07:55:53 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2063</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] cable provider down</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2061</link><description><![CDATA[
As some of you may have already noticed, the site was unavailable for more than a day.<br />
<br />
This outage was widespread and marks the second such occurrence this year.<br />
<br />
We have extended the grace period to 72 hours to compensate for this downtime.<br />
<br />
Please do not cancel any tasks for which the deadline has already passed; these should still be validated. If you encounter any issues, please let us know.<br />
<br />
We apologize for the inconvenience.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 29 Oct 2026 12:57:13 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2061</guid></item><item><title>[YAFU] Aliquot sequence 3828928 has terminated!!!</title><link>https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=675</link><description><![CDATA[
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="https://factordb.com/aliquot.php?type=1&aq=3828928&v=2950"> 
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 28 Oct 2026 19:40:46 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:55:https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=675</guid></item><item><title>[YAFU] Aliquot sequence 3719628 has terminated!!!</title><link>https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=674</link><description><![CDATA[
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="https://factordb.com/aliquot.php?type=1&aq=3719628&v=2335"> 
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 26 Oct 2026 18:01:07 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:55:https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=674</guid></item><item><title>[LHC@home] Unexpected Downtime</title><link>https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/forum_thread.php?id=6557</link><description><![CDATA[
We apologize for the unexpected downtime over the past day.<br />
The outage was caused by the global PHP issue which also affected us. Our team has applied the necessary patches to the servers, and all project services are now back up and running.<br />
Thank you for your patience and ongoing support! Please let us know in this thread if you notice any remaining issues or error messages.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:28:45 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:17:https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/forum_thread.php?id=6557</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] base S60 Megaprime</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2060</link><description><![CDATA[
Sightus@CAU, a member of the team Planet 3DNow! found a megaprime for base S60.<br />
The prime 853*60^613855+1 has 1.091.530 digits and entered the T5k PrimePages.
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 21 Oct 2026 06:49:33 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2060</guid></item><item><title>[NumberFields@home] New Faster Apps Coming Soon</title><link>https://numberfields.asu.edu/NumberFields/forum_thread.php?id=704</link><description><![CDATA[
New optimized versions of the GetDecics app have been discussed in other threads, but I thought it best to start a new thread.<br />
<br />
First, a thank you to Alperen for optimizing the current apps.  Yes, he used Claude, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I don't have the experience required or the time to learn the AVX tricks that were used here.  So without Alperen and Claude, this probably never would have happened.<br />
<br />
I have spent many hours going through the new code.  The original code was basically left untouched, and the change was in the addition of a new subroutine that pre-filters the polynomials prior to the normal processing chain.  This leaves just the one subroutine that needs validation.  From a theoretical perspective, the method is sound.  The method can be decomposed into 2 parts:<br />
<br />
<ul style="word-break:break-word;"> 1.  The first part was a simple trick (I wish I had seen this myself!) that allows us to deal with the polynomial discriminant modulo a small set of primes.  This eliminates the need for the multi-precision integers that were growing to ~1000 bits, and gives the first speed improvement.  This was simple enough I could independently code it up myself using Pari's built-in functions.  In some offline tests I was seeing a speed improvement of between 2 and 3, just for this simple change.<br />
<br />
2.  The second improvement was in the coding of the resultant modulo q.  This was essentially done in parallel using AVX2, which allows resultants to be computed for several primes simultaneously.  This is the part that is very tricky and hard for me to follow.  I welcome any expert in this kind of optimization to look at the code. Alperen has made it public here:<br />
<a href="https://github.com/alplix/passiflora" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/alplix/passiflora</a><br />
</ul><p><br />
<br />
So the method in general is sound, but the second part was hard for me to validate.  For this reason, I will use sufficient testing to validate the new apps.  The idea is to test each new app version on ~1000 old cases which can be taken as truth.  This will be done using the "testDecics" app that was recently created. When an app is deemed good, it will be transitioned into an official app.<br />
<br />
I will be creating a new app called fastGetDecics where the new validated apps will go.  This will still allow me to keep the results separate.  It will also allow me to create new WUs for the fast apps that will not put a burden on the server, while retaining older style WUs for the legacy apps.  This will give me time to test and migrate the fast apps in pieces rather than all at once.  App versions for the original GetDecics will be deprecated once the corresponding fast version has been deemed trustworthy.
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 16 Oct 2026 18:24:26 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:24:https://numberfields.asu.edu/NumberFields/forum_thread.php?id=704</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] base R235 Megaprime</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2058</link><description><![CDATA[
vaughan, a member of the team BOINC@AUSTRALIA found a megaprime for base R235.<br />
The prime 3788*235^455521-1 has 1.080.075 digits and entered the T5k PrimePages.
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 11 Oct 2026 14:16:30 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2058</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] base S52 Megaprime</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2057</link><description><![CDATA[
Science United found a megaprime for base S52.<br />
The prime 25492*52^638823+1 has 1.096.227 digits and entered the T5k PrimePages.
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 10 Oct 2026 14:09:23 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2057</guid></item><item><title>[Asteroids@home] New models published</title><link>https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/forum_thread.php?id=1238</link><description><![CDATA[
It's my pleasure to announce a new paper based on A@H computations with about 30,000 asteroid models reconstructed from survey photometry. This triples the number of asteroids with a shape model. The paper is available at the  Astronomy and Astrophysics journal page: <a href="https://www.aanda.org/component/article?access=doi&doi=10.1051/0004-6361/202662316" rel="nofollow">https://www.aanda.org/component/article?access=doi&doi=10.1051/0004-6361/202662316</a> or at Arxiv: <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.06082" rel="nofollow">https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.06082</a>. The models are available at Zenodo: <a href="https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22812438" rel="nofollow">https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22812438</a> and will also be placed in DAMIT: <a href="https://damit.cuni.cz" rel="nofollow">https://damit.cuni.cz</a>. We thank all the volunteers for their contribution! Meanwhile, the amount of available data has increased, so you are now computing updated datasets, including the first photometry from the Vera Rubin Observatory. We are also currently using the project to process synthetic data to be ready to debias results based on the Gaia Data Release 4, which will be available in December 2026.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 8 Oct 2026 12:18:33 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:11:https://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/forum_thread.php?id=1238</guid></item><item><title>[RakeSearch] Processing of the square # 71 completed</title><link>https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/forum_thread.php?id=399</link><description><![CDATA[
Dear participants, processing of the square # 71 is fully completed! The square:<br />
<br />
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B <br />
1 2 0 4 5 3 8 6 7 B 9 A <br />
3 4 5 0 1 2 9 A B 6 7 8 <br />
6 8 7 9 B A 1 0 2 4 3 5 <br />
8 7 6 B A 9 2 1 0 5 4 3 <br />
9 B A 6 8 7 4 3 5 1 0 2 <br />
A 9 B 7 6 8 3 5 4 0 2 1 <br />
B A 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 <br />
7 6 8 A 9 B 0 2 1 3 5 4 <br />
4 5 3 1 2 0 B 9 A 8 6 7 <br />
2 0 1 5 3 4 7 8 6 A B 9 <br />
5 3 4 2 0 1 A B 9 7 8 6 <br />
<br />
has 25110 diagonal transversals and 443460340 orthogonal mates which puts it on the 60th place of the <a href="http://evatutin.narod.ru/spectra/spectrum_dls_odls_n12_xxxx_known_items.txt" rel="nofollow">rating</a> which included at now 6246 items. Description and results of other studies can be found on <a href="https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/publications.php" rel="nofollow">Publications</a> page also. <br />
<br />
Thank you for project attention, support and donation of CPU time!
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 6 Oct 2026 07:03:58 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:42:https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/forum_thread.php?id=399</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] base S298 Megaprime</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2055</link><description><![CDATA[
Sightus@CAU, a member of the team Planet 3DNow! found a megaprime for base S298.<br />
The prime 168*298^566667+1 has 1.402.059 digits and entered the T5k PrimePages.
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 5 Oct 2026 08:50:06 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2055</guid></item><item><title>[PrimeGrid] Suzuki's Birthday Challenge</title><link>https://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=15957</link><description><![CDATA[
From October 2 17:<b><u>00</u></b> to October 7 17:<b><u>00</u></b> PrimeGrid will be running a 5 day challenge on the GFN-19 project. 

For more information, please see <a href="https://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=15954#190940" rel="nofollow">this forum thread</a>.
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 30 Sep 2026 03:37:56 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:30:https://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=15957</guid></item><item><title>[YAFU] Aliquot sequence 3772368 has terminated!!!</title><link>https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=671</link><description><![CDATA[
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="http://factordb.com/aliquot.php?type=1&aq=3772368"> 
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 26 Sep 2026 20:42:44 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:55:https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=671</guid></item><item><title>[SRBase] BOINC Games challenge 09/25/2026 04:00 (UTC)-09/28/2026 04:00 (UTC)</title><link>https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2053</link><description><![CDATA[
The project was selected. Good luck everyone!
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 25 Sep 2026 07:12:32 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:34:https://srbase.my-firewall.org/sr5/forum_thread.php?id=2053</guid></item><item><title>[RakeSearch] Processing of the square # 70 completed</title><link>https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/forum_thread.php?id=398</link><description><![CDATA[
Dear participants, processing of the square # 70 is fully completed! The square:<br />
<br />
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B<br />
1 2 3 4 9 8 B 5 A 0 6 7<br />
3 4 9 0 1 6 5 A B 2 7 8<br />
7 5 8 A 6 3 0 2 4 B 9 1<br />
5 8 A 6 B 4 1 3 9 7 0 2<br />
9 0 1 2 3 7 A B 5 4 8 6<br />
6 B 7 5 8 1 4 0 2 A 3 9<br />
2 3 4 9 0 A 7 8 6 1 B 5<br />
A 6 B 7 5 0 3 9 1 8 2 4<br />
B 7 5 8 A 2 9 1 3 6 4 0<br />
4 9 0 1 2 B 8 6 7 3 5 A<br />
8 A 6 B 7 9 2 4 0 5 1 3<br />
<br />
has 25140 diagonal transversals and 435445464 orthogonal mates which puts it on the 61th place of the <a href="http://evatutin.narod.ru/spectra/spectrum_dls_odls_n12_xxxx_known_items.txt" rel="nofollow">rating</a> which included at now 6221 items. Description and results of other studies can be found on <a href="https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/publications.php" rel="nofollow">Publications</a> page also. <br />
Now "high part" of spectra of ODLS-12 looks like this (squares # 66 .. 70 marked by magenta):<br />
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/files/exp_1056/odls-12_spectra_high_2026-09-08.png">  <br />
<br />
Thank you for project attention, support and donation of CPU time!
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2026 07:20:00 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:42:https://rake.boincfast.ru/rakesearch/forum_thread.php?id=398</guid></item><item><title>[YAFU] Aliquot sequence 3833886 has terminated!!!</title><link>https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=670</link><description><![CDATA[
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="http://factordb.com/aliquot.php?type=1&aq=3833886"> 
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 23 Sep 2026 18:19:50 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:55:https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=670</guid></item><item><title>[YAFU] Aliquot sequence 3662904 has terminated!!!</title><link>https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=669</link><description><![CDATA[
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="http://factordb.com/aliquot.php?type=1&aq=3662904"> 
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 20 Sep 2026 14:32:20 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:55:https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=669</guid></item><item><title>[NFS@home] Testing GPU Sieving on Apple silicon Macs</title><link>https://escatter11.fullerton.edu/nfs/forum_thread.php?id=950</link><description><![CDATA[
A test version of the GPU sieving application is now available for Apple silicon Macs (M1 and newer). The cuda-sieve code has been ported to Apple’s Metal GPU API, allowing the integrated GPUs in Apple M-series processors to participate in the sieving work.<br />
<br />
This is a new port and has had relatively limited testing, so additional testing across the different generations of Apple silicon would be very helpful. If you have an M1, M2, M3, M4, or newer Mac, please give it a try and let us know how it performs.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 17 Sep 2026 07:02:21 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:29:https://escatter11.fullerton.edu/nfs/forum_thread.php?id=950</guid></item><item><title>[NFS@home] GPU sieving</title><link>https://escatter11.fullerton.edu/nfs/forum_thread.php?id=948</link><description><![CDATA[
Work has progressed nicely on the GPU sieving apps based on cuda-sieve. Linux and Windows apps are now available for NVIDIA GPUs, with support extended to Maxwell (such as the GTX 970) and newer GPUs with at least 4 GB of GPU memory.<br />
<br />
For AMD, the code has been ported using HIP, and a Windows app is now available supporting all RDNA-based GPUs (Radeon RX 5000 series and newer) with at least 4 GB of GPU memory.<br />
<br />
If you have a supported GPU, give it a try!
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 12 Sep 2026 20:02:19 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:29:https://escatter11.fullerton.edu/nfs/forum_thread.php?id=948</guid></item><item><title>[YAFU] Aliquot sequence 3841086 has terminated!!!</title><link>https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=668</link><description><![CDATA[
<img hspace="8" class="img-responsive" src="http://factordb.com/aliquot.php?type=1&aq=3841086"> 
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 12 Sep 2026 19:33:11 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:55:https://yafu.myfirewall.org/yafu/forum_thread.php?id=668</guid></item><item><title>[LODA] Shutdown of LODA BOINC</title><link>https://boinc.loda-lang.org/loda/forum_thread.php?id=156</link><description><![CDATA[
Dear LODA BOINC community,<br />
<br />
After careful consideration, I have decided to shut down the LODA BOINC project.<br />
<br />
When LODA BOINC started, distributed computing was an effective way to search for new LODA programs and mathematical solutions. Recent advances in AI have changed this significantly, and AI-based approaches are now becoming much more effective for this kind of program and formula discovery.<br />
<br />
Therefore, I believe it is time to bring the LODA BOINC project to an end. I would like to sincerely thank everyone who contributed computing power and supported LODA BOINC over the years. Your contributions have been greatly appreciated. The LODA programs and results will remain available on GitHub, so the work produced by the project will continue to be accessible.<br />
<br />
Thank you for being part of the LODA BOINC community!
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 10 Sep 2026 10:00:44 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:53:https://boinc.loda-lang.org/loda/forum_thread.php?id=156</guid></item><item><title>[BOINC] Server outage</title><link>https://boinc.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=15808</link><description><![CDATA[
The server that hosts the BOINC web site, Science United, and BOINC Central, was offline from 3 Sept until today.  There was a maintenance issue that arose suddenly, and took much longer than we anticipated.  We apologize for the inconvenience.  If something like this happens again we'll try to find a substitute server to keep everyone informed.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 10 Sep 2026 07:49:25 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:2000:https://boinc.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=15808</guid></item><item><title>[Yoyo@home] P72 ECM factor!</title><link>http://www.rechenkraft.net/yoyo//all_news.php#336</link><description><![CDATA[User Weber462 found a 72-digit prime factor of an XYYXF number using ECM.  This is the 
            largest ECM factor found this year, 
            and the 31th largest of all time.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 3 Sep 2026 22:00:00 +0000</pubDate><guid isPermaLink="false">vcnews:21:http://www.rechenkraft.net/yoyo//all_news.php#336</guid></item></channel></rss>