Is there a way to crunch for someone without knowing their account & password?

[Mike029]

Was wondering if there was a way to attach to a friends account and throw some stones his way without asking him for his account & password. I remember there was a way years ago using a persons CPID but I don't remember how to do it.

Thanks,
Mike.

[Rattledagger]

Was wondering if there was a way to attach to a friends account and throw some stones his way without asking him for his account & password. I remember there was a way years ago using a persons CPID but I don't remember how to do it.

Hmm, CPID is only used to keep cross-project-stats aligned, and has never been usable to crunch as someone else.

In BOINC there's 3 ways to specify the account:
1: Joining a project by using email + password (or username + password then it comes to WCG). As part of joining a computer to a project, you'll get the account-key that is used in all further client/server-communications.
2: Use the "strong" account-key. The account-key is 32 hexadecimal characters long, meaning only numbers 0 - 9 and letters a - f.
3: Use the weak account key. This is acccount-number, a underscore and 32 hexadecimal characters that depends on the password.

With either #1 or #2 you've got full control of someones account, but with #3 you've only got limited access so can't example change team and so on.

So, if you want to crunch under someone else's account, you'll need to ask them to send their weak account-key.

To use the weak account-key, example make a file called account_boincsimap.org_boincsimap.xml and place it in your BOINC data-directory, that contains something like:

<account>
    <master_url>http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap/</master_url>
    <authenticator>123456_0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef</authenticator>
</account>

After making the file, just re-start BOINC-client.

Note, the authenticator in the example is not a valid one, so it's a waste of time to try using it.

[Mike029]

Thank you Rattledagger. It was with the use of weak account key not the CPID.

[trigggl]

So, if you want to crunch under someone else's account, you'll need to ask them to send their weak account-key.

To use the weak account-key, example make a file called account_boincsimap.org_boincsimap.xml and place it in your BOINC data-directory, that contains something like:

<account>
    <master_url>http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap/</master_url>
    <authenticator>123456_0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef</authenticator>
</account>

After making the file, just re-start BOINC-client.

Note, the authenticator in the example is not a valid one, so it's a waste of time to try using it.

Or, you could just use command line while boinc is running.

boinccmd --project_attach http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap/ 123456_0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef

I think that works with the weak account key. I know it does for the strong one.

[Mumps]

Or, you could just use command line while boinc is running.

boinccmd --project_attach http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap/ 123456_0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef

I think that works with the weak account key. I know it does for the strong one.

Are you sure about that one trigggl? I use that command line, but with the account number returned by the "--lookup_account" option. Which requires using the email and password to retrieve the Hex number used to attach...

test=`./boinccmd --lookup_account http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap $email $password | awk '/key:/ { print \$3 }'`
echo $test; ./boinccmd --project_attach http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap $test

Not sure if --project_attach would work with either. Wouldn't surprise me if it did though. I seriously doubt that's the weak account key it returns though.

[trigggl]

Are you sure about that one trigggl? I use that command line, but with the account number returned by the "--lookup_account" option. Which requires using the email and password to retrieve the Hex number used to attach...

test=`./boinccmd --lookup_account http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap $email $password | awk '/key:/ { print \$3 }'`
echo $test; ./boinccmd --project_attach http://boincsimap.org/boincsimap $test

Not sure if --project_attach would work with either. Wouldn't surprise me if it did though. I seriously doubt that's the weak account key it returns though.

Just tried it to connect one of my hosts to SETI. It worked.

EDIT: To be clear what I tried

 boinccmd --host imgig --project_attach http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/ 9010782_fedcba9876543210fedcba9876543210e7c

(account key altered to protect the obnoxious)

[Duke of Buckingham]

(account key altered to protect the obnoxious)

?OBNOXIOUS?

[Rattledagger]

Just tried it to connect one of my hosts to SETI. It worked.

EDIT: To be clear what I tried

 boinccmd --host imgig --project_attach http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/ 9010782_fedcba9876543210fedcba9876543210e7c

(account key altered to protect the obnoxious)

Ah, good to know this method also works with the weak account-key, since this means you don't need to re-start the BOINC-client.