Account Key

From Unofficial BOINC Wiki

[edit] General

An Account Key is a (at least for the standard BOINC Powered Projects and the BOINC Client Software) 32-byte random and unique identifier string that is the means that the Participant will use to establish their identity. The Account Key is issued on request and delivered to the person that made the request through an e-Mail to the user's e-Mail address (you did put in a valid e-Mail address, didn't you?). One of the uses of the Account Key is to establish the identity of the Participant to the project Servers. This Account Key (identity) needs to be sent to the Server to establish the validity of the Participant during each session connection to the Web Servers. Especially if the session is for the display and possible alteration of the Participant's Profile data. Access for creating messages on the Forums, and contacting the Data Servers for obtaining work may also require the Account Key.

The use of the each of these Account Keys will usually only be once for most Participants. The Account Key will have to be entered one time into the BOINC Client Software and also into your Web Browser after which these programs will automatically enter the correct value for you each time. If you reinstall your Operating System, change Web Browser, erase cookies, or a half a dozen other things, well, you did keep a print out of the value, didn't you? (If all else fails, the key can be found in your BOINC Data folder, in a file for each project such as account_setiathome.berkeley.edu.xml.)

Current policy for the SETI@Home Project (for example) is that loss of an Account Key will require the establishment of a brand new Account and all the work effort in the other Account stays there. Most Projects will likely have similar policies.

A tip: So, protect all of those Account Keys you get in the mail.

[edit] Synonyms

• Authenticator
• Account ID