Folding Forum

I'm not sure there's a reasonable way to fix this sort of problem except by making it clear in the FAQ. Large proteins can easily be distributed to large numbers of cores, but at some point, small proteins do not fold well with larger numbers of cores. If specific servers are off-line and there are no proteins with enough atoms to be rationally distributed across 24 cores, the Assignment Server will correctly report that there are no projects that fit your needs.

This is really an unusual situation. Although it's contrary to normal recommendations, apparently you have already have discovered that you can configure two 12-core slots and work on two proteins at the same time.

There still needs to be a way for the AS to recognize the incompatibility of too many cores to process this type of WU and pass off the assignment to another AS rather than have the user's computer being unable to receive a WU to process and stay in this mode forever.

{You mean another WS, not another AS.}

I did discuss the issue with the PG. Simply removing the maximum number of cores restriction for specific servers and/or specific projects will provide (temporary?) relief from the problem. Adding another level of complexity to the Assignment Server logic is not likely to happen any time soon, especially if the relief ends up solving it permanently.

Then a FAQ is needed that addresses this issue so those computers are not left idle when they attempt to download a 6XXX that has the 12 core max processor limit.

I would say that it is already addressed in the FAQ in an indirect manner (https://folding.stanford.edu/home/faq/#ntoc52). The current situation is lack of WUs for a particular configuration. This will hopefully be resolved in the future. This isn't an end of support so in future, WUs will be available (however, there isn't any ETA).