BOINC, Rosetta@home and what was ported¶

Rosetta's scientific C++ methods have been ported to WebAssembly. The BOINC client has not been ported. BOINC provides the surrounding volunteer-computing platform: it allocates work, downloads application and data files, manages execution, reports results and supports project validation and credit. Rosetta is the scientific application launched by BOINC. BOINC overview, native application API.

BOINC reference environment¶

The arm64 macOS reference environment used for comparison contained BOINC 8.2.11, a Rosetta Beta 6.04 x86_64 scientific executable, its graphics executable and a 418,361,967-byte database ZIP. No downloaded Rosetta workunits or results were present, so the environment provided no assigned task for reproduction.

A reference experiment ran the installed scientific executable on the repository's 1L2Y fixture in isolated scratch storage with networking denied. The executable reported source 76e2f63f750b32d50338385a5e1d99ecb36da226, which differs from the browser port's pinned source. Retained evidence includes inputs, outputs, hashes, sanitized logs and a common-scorer comparison. This experiment compares an official executable against WASM on a reference structure; it does not reproduce an assigned Rosetta@home workunit. See benchmarks.

The capture utility, scripts/capture-boinc-task.py, preserves an already downloaded task's allowlisted metadata, files, mappings and hashes without controlling the BOINC client. It excludes account and authentication files and does not request new work or upload results. The browser importer can derive a supported coordinate benchmark from captured PDB data. That derived benchmark does not reproduce arbitrary original flags, constraints or application behavior.

On the project application page checked October 9, 2026, published families include Rosetta, Rosetta Beta, Rosetta Mini and VirtualBox-based Python projects. No browser/WASM platform is listed. The current listing is separate from locally retained older files. Official application list.

Native and browser execution paths¶

Rosetta@home / BOINC                       RoTab browser campaign
------------------------------------      ----------------------------------
project work generator                    publisher's IndexedDB campaign
        ↓                                          ↓
BOINC scheduler and download servers      Nostr presence / encrypted signaling
        ↓                                          ↓
BOINC client + native app in slot          signed job via direct WebRTC
        ↓                                          ↓
native Rosetta C++ + full task files       packaged Rosetta C++ in WASM worker
        ↓                                          ↓
native output files / graphics memory     live PDB/REF2015 snapshots + output
        ↓                                          ↓
project upload, validation, credit        signed browser outbox → publisher
                                                  ↓
                                          stored receipt; science unverified

The arrows describe different protocols. A RoTab receipt means a matching output was stored once; it does not mean the Rosetta@home validator accepted it.

Capability mapping¶

BOINC / Rosetta behavior	Browser replacement or reuse	Current gap
Rosetta Pose, chemical types, energy terms and movers	Compile upstream C++ libraries with Emscripten	Only reduced REF2015/canonical coordinate surface admitted
Native scientific executable	`rosetta.mjs` + `rosetta.wasm`	Native binaries cannot simply run as WASM
Scientific database files	Traced package preloaded into Emscripten `/database`	Resources not certified for all Rosetta protocols/chemistries
BOINC task slots and OS processes	Dedicated workers and Emscripten memory filesystem	No equivalent native process/VM/MPI execution
Work generator and scheduler	Publisher-owned campaign queue and fenced model leases	Custom RoTab schema, not BOINC scheduler XML
Workunit/application downloads	Packaged executable code; direct signed input data	No native-platform impersonation or general workunit downloader
Account, host and project identity	Local P-256 participant identity plus Nostr relay key	No BOINC account attachment, host ID or project authorization
CPU preference / suspend	Worker count, cooperative duty target, worker termination	No OS scheduler integration; startup is partly synchronous
Native checkpoint	Completed-model IndexedDB boundary plus seed replay	No exact mid-minimizer/annealer/Pose+RNG checkpoint
Shared-memory graphics	Instrumented snapshots of scientific states	Original native graphics ABI not reused in the browser
Result upload and retry	Signed durable outbox, direct receipt, idempotent storage	No official upload/report/assimilation path
Scientific validation and credit	Developer native rescoring; UI labels unverified peer results	No distributed validator, project acceptance or official credit
Always-on native daemon	Open-tab ownership and handover	Closing the last tab stops browser computation

What an official workunit contains¶

A BOINC job can reference multiple input and output files with logical names understood by the scientific application. Task metadata also identifies the application, arguments, deadlines and resource bounds. Per-application templates describe file mappings and output size limits. A ZIP is a container for some jobs, not a universal scientific workunit format. BOINC job templates, job submission and control.

The pinned Rosetta BOINC application includes archive extraction/file resolution and dispatches on run:protocol; work can involve sequence/fragments, structures, constraints, templates, ligands, symmetry definitions or scripts. It can emit silent structure records rather than just one PDB. The list of 19 source branches is documented in experimental modules. A source branch's presence does not establish that Rosetta@home currently sends that workload. Pinned minirosetta.cc.

Volunteer parallelism commonly distributes independent model attempts and sampling jobs. In RoTab, each attempt receives the complete supported input chain. Modeling a domain or segment requires a defined scientific protocol, boundary conditions and validation; cutting coordinates alone would not preserve interactions with omitted residues.

Relationship to the native scientific application¶

The production coordinate harness calls upstream scientific classes directly. It does not call the BOINC scheduler, runtime supervisor, slot resolver or native shared-memory graphics. Separate research builds also link the upstream minirosetta scientific dispatcher and a smaller cyclic family, but those have their own unpassed browser/admission gates.

Official browser-client support would require project agreement on an application and platform identity, engine distribution rights, a reviewed input feed, exact protocol and file contracts, native/browser validation, safe result reporting and accepted project results. These contracts must also specify flags and database resources. The scope reference describes related development areas. Agreement on one REF2015 score does not establish these operational requirements.