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"Help save the world."

You see this is an appeal for you to join www.find-a-drug.co.uk You might have heard about SETI@home, you know the thing where a program runs in the background using your unused processing power to scan data from a satellite dish.

Well FAD is similar in operation, except that instead of looking for aliens it looks for molecules and proteins that can be targeted for further research and stuff in finding a cure for cancer.

I have been running distributed computing projects for over a year now.
It doesn't require much effort, you download a small program and a work unit (WU). Then the program runs in the background just processing. When it finishes that WU it moves on to the next in the queue of 2 or 3 that you download every so often from the net. When it is finished it gets sent back to FAD.

The program doesn't cause slowdown, it only uses unused power, as whenever you do anything else like type a letter it lets you do that and then starts processing again. After all other than in video editing or really high powered games you only ever use an average of 10% or so of your computers capacity. So why don't you donate it to a good cause?

FAD has several ongoing projects. Currently these are cancer, HIV, malaria, multiple sclerosis, SARS and bio terrorism antidotes.

If you do decide to join, I have now created a Special Reserve team. The team number for entering on the setup screen is 2072. So come on join up. So far there is 13 of us in the team. Out of 147 teams, Special Reserve is ranked 54. There is even a linux version now.

One day our efforts could make a difference. Imagine the lives that could be saved. In Britain, 1 in 3 people get cancer. Over a million people a year die in developing countries from Malaria, 3 times as many as AIDS kills. Even so, HIV is at epidemic levels and kills 100,000s a year all around the world. 40 million people in Africa have HIV, and in time it will kill them all.

This project doesn't require anything much of you, all you have to do run the program in the background. You can help to make a difference. It all builds up, just from lots of people running this. So far nearly 4,000 years worth of computer time has been spent scanning 27.62 billion moleculules.

There have been successes in finding growth inhibitors on several occasions in several areas. So come on, join us and help save the world.

Yep, that's always been the trouble... keeping people running it.

My UD agent is always running, unless I'm playing a game. Most people seem to forget to load it (after taking it out of their Startup folder), or just remove it after a while.

I'm going to d/l the FAD and run them both.

I know it's not the over-riding factor, but they could do with a better site. The look of the site could put a lot of people off. Had it not been recommended, I don't think I would have trusted it.

Yeah I know. I used to run UD, but it lacks a few features of Find A Drug, and that coupled with the fact that FAD runs 40 times faster than Ligandfit and there being more FAD projects made me suggest it.

Looks like it is just the three of you left...

Sorry if it's already been mentioned, but I can't be asked to read through the whole thread...

There's also GRiD.org/United Devices ([URL]http://www.grid.org[/URL]), which has been going for years and has a Special Reserve team.

[URL]http://www.grid.org/services/teams/team.htm?id=33041647-2DD6-49AD-9E39-F44C37F0DF58[/URL] for the SR team page.

Your stats show up with all the other team members.

And how did you know that?!

Pooch?!`

I was dani47. Now it's different, but no worries! Goooo Team 2072, etcetc.

So you were Dani47 (or something like that) then?

I see you abandoned the team as well. Humph.

Oo, makes you feel special! The slow ones are annoying, had one which took a few days to complete and only found 15 hits.

Cool. Now I've got broadband I might give this another go.