Request for information and/or assistance...

[ENGRPOD]

To all SETI-USA members:

I had subscribed to BOINC some time ago, due to interest in getting involved, so far as possible, in the more technical aspects of the SETI-at-home project. I just re-downloaded BOINC, and restarted downloading SETI tasks to run while I was online. I was sending this to try to get any possible help in locating those groups and/or users, whether near me, or otherwise, that might hvae similar technical interests in SETI technology, specifically high-level scientific and/or engineering aspects in particular.

I no longer work due to my now total and permanent disability, and have been seeking to become more involved with SETI, purely as an avocation. However, I can offer SETI USA a good deal of very serious technical experience, as I was originally trained as an electrical engineer (EE), physicist, and mathematician; I have had very serious training in signal processing,as well as done a good deal of technical work in technical fields which, while not directly involved with SETI, you would all certainly and immediately understand are, at minimum, either highly relevant, and/or directly translatable. I also have extensive general RF-system background, that might likewise possibly be of potential use, even if only on a purely hobbyist/avocation level, which I would greatly wish to use through serious technical involvement with SETI USA.

Specifically, I would be most interested in getting any available technical information on how it might be possible for an ordinary SETI-BOINC user like myself to possibly obtain copies of actual SETI data, ifthat might be feasible. Please understand: In asking that, I am obviously referring merely to download of data work packets, so far as might be allowed. I would be interested in experimenting on such date using general-purpose commercial and/or open-source signal-processing, mathematical, and/or statistical software I either have available, or might possibly be able to obtain. I am quite familiar with a good many such general-purpose software packages, many of which other members of SETI-USA mightbe familiar with, while others many members might not be.

Having also had serious clinical training in the past prior to my disability, I have also obviously had numerous other serious research interests in both bioengineering, as well as biophysics. As such, I am also quite familiar with many research fields, other than EE, physics, and/or math; for that reason, such background might likewise be of further possible use to SETI-USA,as I do of course try to stay abreast of many areas in serious exobiology, so far as I can, given my present circumstances.

My hope is that all of you might possibly find my background sufficiently useful to beable to afford all of you a somewhat different, and, hopefully, unique scientific perspective to justify your allowing my serious scientific involvement on a purely hobbyist/avocation level, in the fashion I have described. For those reasons, I would thus be most grateful to hear from any of the SETI-USA administrators about my request(s), or to be referred to such other members as mightbe deemed suitable for such serious, high-level, purely technical discussions.

I have provided both my Skype and AIM links, on the profile page, should any of you wish to speak with me; if I am online, using either AOL (which of course includes AIM), and/or Skype, please certainly feel free to IM me, and I will of course do my best to answer as rapidly as possible. Or, if preferred, please feel free to message me through the SETI-USA site, and I will likewise do my best to respond as soon as I become aware that any message(s) might have been sent. I appreciate your time and attention, would of course be most grateful for your serious consideration, would obviously hope that by background and/or interest(s) might be deemed to be of serious possible use, and would look forward to any possible response(s) at the earliest possible convenience.

Sincerely,

ENGRPOD.

[JerWA]

SETI.USA is a team, not a project. We don't have any access to anything beyond the same stuff you get from the client.

If you want to get involved in the SETI project itself, you'd have to talk to Berkeley: http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/

The same is true for any other project. You'd need to talk to the project administrator(s). :)

[Crazybob]

ENGPROD, our team goals are to find ways to run through the data provided by the projects as fast and as economical as possible while obtaining the most credit for such work as possible, all the while contributing to the science and culmination of the various projects out there. Our expertise is mostly in the hardware needed and the optimization of the software to accomplish these goals. By being a contributor to the SETI@Home project, you will be sent data packets from the Aericibo antenna to have your computer analyze for candidate signals. As far as the program used to do this work, I'm not sure if it is open source or not. As JerWA stated in his reply, it is probably better to contact the project directly through the Berkeley campus to see if your special skills might be utilized by them to further the science. As far as being a part of SETI.USA, we would not want to discourage you from being a member of our team. On the contrary, your insight into the science and analysis of candidate signals would be a plus to the team and be very well appreciated. You also might find that by being part of the team you can get extra enjoyment by being part of the conversations and the exchange of ideas or taking part in some of the challenges the team gets involved in with other teams from around the globe.