How do you make sure the client with no WU starts "paused"?

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BP2020
Posts: 46
Joined: Sun Apr 19, 2020 9:53 pm

How do you make sure the client with no WU starts "paused"?

Post by BP2020 »

A feature I really like about the Advanced Control is the Finish function, which finishes the current WU(s) assigned then pauses. Sometimes I know I must shut down the computer for all sorts of reasons and I don't want to get assigned another WU then shutdown then waste time "hogging" it for no reason (and lose points). I don't know exactly why but I remember at some point I close the client in that state (i.e. paused after all assignments were completed) but then when I restarted in some way (I speculate it's with the Web Control) it automatically resumed, got assigned a WU and started folding again. Or sometimes I'll be reinstalling and I want to make sure everything is alright before being assigned a WU. I looked at the switches for the FAHClient.exe (--help) and found:

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--send-pause [string]
      Pause a slot or all slots on an already running client.
But that's an already running client. Is there a way to make sure a client with no WU assigned starts in a paused state? Is that an extra slot option or expert setting for client or core under Configure but what if that's the first time you start the client ever (would you use the sample.xml config file and how; is that "pause-on-start" and can you pass that to FAHClient.exe directly?
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Joe_H
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Re: How do you make sure the client with no WU starts "pause

Post by Joe_H »

There is an option, pause-on-start, that if set to 'true' will keep the client from starting up until manually started. It can be either be set as an option for a specific folding slot, or set globally. In FAHControl it would either be added to a slot's configuration, or as an Extra Client Option under the Expert tab. and apply to all slots.
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BP2020
Posts: 46
Joined: Sun Apr 19, 2020 9:53 pm

Re: How do you make sure the client with no WU starts "pause

Post by BP2020 »

Thank you! I had selected the Finish function in the Advanced Control and I set pause-on-start to true in the Extra Client Options under the Expert tab in the Configure panel before I quit the client. When I restarted the client I was still in that state (pause) and that's the general use case when I want to use this.

I also looked inside the config.xml file and noted it created the following entry (of course there are other things encased in the config tags):

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<config>
<!-- Slot Control -->
  <pause-on-start v='true'/>
</config>
I speculate upon first installing I could simply create a config.xml file in the FAHClient directory (i.e. /Users/User_account_used_for_install/AppData/Roaming/FAHClient) and put that in to make sure when the client launches for the first time it doesn't actually start looking for assignments etc. so that I could check the configuration before starting folding. It's in line with what the sample.xml file and the linked post describe but I haven't tried this...
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FoldingFodder
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Re: How do you make sure the client with no WU starts "pause

Post by FoldingFodder »

If you go to the command prompt or equivalent for the OS you use and type

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FAHclient --help
. You'll see a number of options you can use.

Obviously, be careful with what you do. As i imagine you can screw up your installation.
bruce
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Re: How do you make sure the client with no WU starts "pause

Post by bruce »

I've used pause-on-start=true on almost all my machines for a long, long time. My only exception is a laptop which has no supported GPU. I want it to start folding as soon as the OS is booted, not waiting for me to log on. I install FAH as a service on that machine. (GPUs are prohibited from operating in a Windows service.)
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