The hardware is a raspberry pi Zero running Raspbian Buster armv61
Using boinctui headless over ssh, installed from apt repository
boinc client manager version 2.5.0

boinctui runs ok, and projects can be added, they fetch tasks but the calculation completes in about 1 second (clearly some sort of failure) and then there is a message about no output file.

I've tried reinstalling boinctui and boinc-client, i've tried running with and without sudo.

these are a couple of the projects with this behaviour which I think should work:

LHC@home
Einstein@home

i've tried to find a log file but not had much luck, not really sure what i'm looking for.

For help finding logs, check out this thread

The hardware is a raspberry pi Zero running Raspbian Buster armv61
Using boinctui headless over ssh, installed from apt repository
boinc client manager version 2.5.0

boinctui runs ok, and projects can be added, they fetch tasks but the calculation completes in about 1 second (clearly some sort of failure) and then there is a message about no output file.

I've tried reinstalling boinctui and boinc-client, i've tried running with and without sudo.

these are a couple of the projects with this behaviour which I think should work:

LHC@home
Einstein@home

i've tried to find a log file but not had much luck, not really sure what i'm looking for.

As I recall the Pi Zero was 32bit and only had 0.5gb of memory both of which could be a problem. Sadly I don’t know the two projects you mention well enough to know their requirements.

---

Thanks Dave, I think there isn't a log file. I tried using find as below:

sudo find / -name "stdout*"

and this was all that turned up:

/usr/share/man/man3/stdout.3.gz
/run/systemd/journal/stdout
/home/pi/stdoutgpudetect.txt
/var/lib/boinc-client/stdoutgpudetect.txt
/dev/stdout

The thread you linked to suggested there might not be a log file and it may be outputting to system journal. So here is a dump produced with the below command:

journalctl --unit=boinc-client

-- Logs begin at Sat 2021-01-23 16:21:33 GMT, end at Sat 2021-01-23 16:56:03 GMT. --
Jan 23 16:21:59 pizero systemd[1]: Started Berkeley Open Infrastructure Network Computing Client.
Jan 23 16:22:00 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:00 [---] Starting BOINC client version 7.14.2 for arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf
Jan 23 16:22:00 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:00 [---] log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
Jan 23 16:22:00 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:00 [---] Libraries: libcurl/7.64.0 OpenSSL/1.1.1d zlib/1.2.11 libidn2/2.0.5 libpsl/0.20.2 (+libidn2/2.0.5) libssh2/1.8.0 nghttp2/1.36.0 librtmp/2.3
Jan 23 16:22:00 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:00 [---] Data directory: /var/lib/boinc-client
Jan 23 16:22:01 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:01 [---] No usable GPUs found
Jan 23 16:22:01 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:01 [LHC@home] App version has unsupported platform aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu; changing to arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] [libc detection] gathered: 2.28, Debian GLIBC 2.28-10+rpi1
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Host name: pizero
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Processor: 1 ARM ARMv6-compatible processor rev 7 (v6l) [Impl 0x41 Arch 7 Variant 0x0 Part 0xb76 Rev 7]
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Processor features: half thumb fastmult vfp edsp java tls
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] OS: Linux Raspbian: Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 (buster) [5.4.83+|libc 2.28 (Debian GLIBC 2.28-10+rpi1)]
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Memory: 479.44 MB physical, 355.99 MB virtual
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Disk: 14.33 GB total, 12.15 GB free
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Local time is UTC +0 hours
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Config: GUI RPCs allowed from:
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [Asteroids@home] URL http://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/; Computer ID not assigned yet; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [Einstein@Home] URL http://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/; Computer ID 12868528; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [LHC@home] URL https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/; Computer ID 10679395; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [Rosetta@home] URL https://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/; Computer ID 5996956; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [Einstein@Home] General prefs: from Einstein@Home (last modified 22-Jan-2021 16:37:18)
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [Einstein@Home] Host location: none
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [Einstein@Home] General prefs: using your defaults
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Reading preferences override file
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Preferences:
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] max memory usage when active: 383.55 MB
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] max memory usage when idle: 431.50 MB
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] max disk usage: 10.00 GB
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)
Jan 23 16:22:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:03 [---] Setting up project and slot directories
Jan 23 16:22:04 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:04 [---] Checking active tasks
Jan 23 16:22:04 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:04 [---] Setting up GUI RPC socket
Jan 23 16:22:04 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:04 [---] gui_rpc_auth.cfg is empty - no GUI RPC password protection
Jan 23 16:22:04 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:04 [---] Checking presence of 32 project files
Jan 23 16:22:04 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:04 Initialization completed
Jan 23 16:24:52 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:25:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:03 [---] Running CPU benchmarks
Jan 23 16:25:03 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:03 [---] Suspending computation - CPU benchmarks in progress
Jan 23 16:25:35 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:35 [---] Benchmark results:
Jan 23 16:25:35 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:35 [---] Number of CPUs: 1
Jan 23 16:25:35 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:35 [---] 521 floating point MIPS (Whetstone) per CPU
Jan 23 16:25:35 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:35 [---] 7472 integer MIPS (Dhrystone) per CPU
Jan 23 16:25:36 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:25:36 [---] Resuming computation
Jan 23 16:25:53 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:26:54 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:27:54 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:28:55 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:29:56 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:30:57 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:31:57 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:32:16 pizero boinc[396]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:38:37 pizero systemd[1]: Stopping Berkeley Open Infrastructure Network Computing Client...
Jan 23 16:38:38 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:38 [---] Received signal 15
Jan 23 16:38:38 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:38 [---] Exiting
Jan 23 16:38:38 pizero systemd[1]: boinc-client.service: Succeeded.
Jan 23 16:38:38 pizero systemd[1]: Stopped Berkeley Open Infrastructure Network Computing Client.
Jan 23 16:38:38 pizero systemd[1]: Started Berkeley Open Infrastructure Network Computing Client.
Jan 23 16:38:39 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:39 [---] Starting BOINC client version 7.14.2 for arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf
Jan 23 16:38:39 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:39 [---] log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
Jan 23 16:38:39 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:39 [---] Libraries: libcurl/7.64.0 OpenSSL/1.1.1d zlib/1.2.11 libidn2/2.0.5 libpsl/0.20.2 (+libidn2/2.0.5) libssh2/1.8.0 nghttp2/1.36.0 librtmp/2.3
Jan 23 16:38:39 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:39 [---] Data directory: /var/lib/boinc-client
Jan 23 16:38:39 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:39 [---] No usable GPUs found
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] [libc detection] gathered: 2.28, Debian GLIBC 2.28-10+rpi1
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Host name: pizero
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Processor: 1 ARM ARMv6-compatible processor rev 7 (v6l) [Impl 0x41 Arch 7 Variant 0x0 Part 0xb76 Rev 7]
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Processor features: half thumb fastmult vfp edsp java tls
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] OS: Linux Raspbian: Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 (buster) [5.4.83+|libc 2.28 (Debian GLIBC 2.28-10+rpi1)]
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Memory: 479.44 MB physical, 355.99 MB virtual
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Disk: 14.33 GB total, 12.15 GB free
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Local time is UTC +0 hours
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Config: GUI RPCs allowed from:
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Asteroids@home] URL http://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/; Computer ID not assigned yet; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Einstein@Home] URL http://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/; Computer ID 12868528; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [LHC@home] URL https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/; Computer ID 10679395; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Rosetta@home] URL https://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/; Computer ID 5996956; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Einstein@Home] General prefs: from Einstein@Home (last modified 22-Jan-2021 16:37:18)
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Einstein@Home] Host location: none
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Einstein@Home] General prefs: using your defaults
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Reading preferences override file
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Preferences:
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] max memory usage when active: 383.55 MB
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] max memory usage when idle: 431.50 MB
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] max disk usage: 10.00 GB
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Setting up project and slot directories
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Checking active tasks
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Setting up GUI RPC socket
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] gui_rpc_auth.cfg is empty - no GUI RPC password protection
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Checking presence of 32 project files
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 Initialization completed
Jan 23 16:40:40 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:41:41 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:42:41 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:43:42 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:44:43 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:45:43 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:46:44 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:47:45 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:48:45 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:49:46 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:54:36 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:54:44 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:44 [LHC@home] project resumed by user
Jan 23 16:54:46 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:46 [LHC@home] Sending scheduler request: To report completed tasks.
Jan 23 16:54:46 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:46 [LHC@home] Reporting 1 completed tasks
Jan 23 16:54:46 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:46 [LHC@home] Requesting new tasks for CPU
Jan 23 16:54:48 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:48 [LHC@home] Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Jan 23 16:54:48 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:48 [LHC@home] No tasks sent
Jan 23 16:54:58 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:58 [LHC@home] Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Jan 23 16:54:58 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:58 [LHC@home] Requesting new tasks for CPU
Jan 23 16:54:59 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:59 [LHC@home] Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Jan 23 16:54:59 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:54:59 [LHC@home] No tasks sent
Jan 23 16:55:07 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:07 [LHC@home] update requested by user
Jan 23 16:55:09 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:09 [LHC@home] Sending scheduler request: Requested by user.
Jan 23 16:55:09 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:09 [LHC@home] Requesting new tasks for CPU
Jan 23 16:55:11 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:11 [LHC@home] Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Jan 23 16:55:11 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:11 [LHC@home] No tasks sent
Jan 23 16:55:21 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:21 [LHC@home] Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Jan 23 16:55:21 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:21 [LHC@home] Requesting new tasks for CPU
Jan 23 16:55:23 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:23 [LHC@home] Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Jan 23 16:55:23 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:23 [LHC@home] No tasks sent
Jan 23 16:55:31 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:31 [LHC@home] project suspended by user
Jan 23 16:55:37 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.
Jan 23 16:55:38 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:38 [Einstein@Home] project resumed by user
Jan 23 16:55:43 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:43 [Einstein@Home] Sending scheduler request: To report completed tasks.
Jan 23 16:55:43 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:43 [Einstein@Home] Reporting 1 completed tasks
Jan 23 16:55:43 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:43 [Einstein@Home] Requesting new tasks for CPU
Jan 23 16:55:47 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:47 [Einstein@Home] Scheduler request completed: got 1 new tasks
Jan 23 16:55:47 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:47 [Einstein@Home] update requested by user
Jan 23 16:55:49 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:49 [Einstein@Home] Started download of p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000_1649.bin4
Jan 23 16:55:49 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:49 [Einstein@Home] Started download of p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000.zap
Jan 23 16:55:50 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:50 [Einstein@Home] Finished download of p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000.zap
Jan 23 16:55:51 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:51 [Einstein@Home] Finished download of p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000_1649.bin4
Jan 23 16:55:52 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:52 [Einstein@Home] Starting task p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000_1649_0
Jan 23 16:55:52 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:52 [Einstein@Home] Sending scheduler request: Requested by user.
Jan 23 16:55:52 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:52 [Einstein@Home] Not requesting tasks: don't need (job cache full)
Jan 23 16:55:53 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:53 [Einstein@Home] Computation for task p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000_1649_0 finished
Jan 23 16:55:53 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:53 [Einstein@Home] Output file p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000_1649_0_0 for task p2030.20170622.G35.45+03.04.S.b3s0g0.00000_1649_0 absent
Jan 23 16:55:55 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:55:55 [Einstein@Home] Scheduler request completed
Jan 23 16:56:03 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:56:03 [Einstein@Home] project suspended by user

The lack of output file will be because the task crashed so the file wasn't created.

 Jan 23 16:22:01 pizero boinc[396]: 23-Jan-2021 16:22:01 [LHC@home] App version has unsupported platform aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu; changing to arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf

This bit in the output you posted suggests LHC doesn't support your cpu. Not sure why given that, it still downloads tasks though?

Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] gui_rpc_auth.cfg is empty - no GUI RPC password protection
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [---] Checking presence of 32 project files
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 Initialization completed
Jan 23 16:40:40 pizero boinc[563]: dir_open: Could not open directory 'locale' from '/var/lib/boinc-client'.

I am also wondering if there is a permissions issue here?

That's exactly what was being requested by way of a log file - you've found the right place. These lines help us to get further information from the project web sites.

Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Einstein@Home] URL http://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/; Computer ID 12868528; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [LHC@home] URL https://lhcathome.cern.ch/lhcathome/; Computer ID 10679395; resource share 100
Jan 23 16:38:40 pizero boinc[563]: 23-Jan-2021 16:38:40 [Rosetta@home] URL https://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/; Computer ID 5996956; resource share 100

Just taking the first, it gets us to:

TASKS FOR COMPUTER 12868528 (sorry - their caps, not mine!)

As you surmised, all the tasks finished early with an error - that was the reason for them failing to produce an output file. The few I've checked all say

process exited with code 127 (0x7f, -129)</message>
<stderr_txt>
../../projects/einstein.phys.uwm.edu/einsteinbinary_BRP4_1.06_arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf: relocation error: ../../projects/einstein.phys.uwm.edu/einsteinbinary_BRP4_1.06_arm-unknown-linux-gnueabihf: symbol h_errno version GLIBC_PRIVATE not defined in file libc.so.6 with link time reference

I don't know enough about Linux library linkage to take you any further, but it's a starting point.

ok thanks everyone for the help here.

I believe Einstein@home does support the PI zero, at least i've seen seen a few anecdotes of people running it successfully.

I wonder if i'm just using too new a version of Raspbian, and the Einstein binary isn't compiled for it.

It seems like this problem:

https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=197346

Perhaps I should try installing Jessie. I'll give that a go and report back.

Yes! thats done it. I installed Jessie lite and an Einstein task is now happily running (but rather slowly of course) .

https://einsteinathome.org/task/1062254365

I'll have to wait and see if its completes correctly, but its running at least which it wasn't before.

Thanks for all your help.

Most computing errors seem to crash at about 4 minutes in.
My question would be if you have enough space on the SD card,
Also, how much RAM is used.
Headless is key, and reduce VRAM to 8MB (or 16MB at most), as the default 24-128MB VRAM is eating too much ram.
Use a program like HTOP to see if your ram isn't utilized too much, and best for this system is to disable SWAP, because errors come from lots of read/writes to swap.
Uninstall most crap you don't need. Basically a naked OS, with just Boinc installed and the necessary internet drivers.
Also, make sure the GPU drivers aren't installed, and you have the basic terminal output, not a fancy 720 or 1080p version. Saves more memory.

That certainly looks to have worked.
One task completed on the 26th having run for about 26 hours has been validated.
OK it's slow, but then Raspberry Pi of any description aren't noted for being the fastest computers on the block.
As I type there's another task that's about 12 hours into its run which is looking promising :-)

Thanks for the advice. I'm running Rasbian Lite, so there is no desktop and i'm just SSHing in to the command line, which is why i'm using boinctui. I've disabled the swap as you suggest, I don't really want it writing to the card any more than it has to, i've experience in the past of programs destroying sd cards very rapidly by continuously writing out logs to them.

Running top, I can see boinc using about 98% cpu and 19% ram, so hopefully thats ok. Is there a way to tell how much the SD card is being used?

the einstein tasks don't seem to be using a lot of ram at all, all things considered. If it is using the SD card much, maybe setting up a little ram drive for it to run in might be possible. Do einstein tasks generally write to the drive a lot?

Most applications write to the "disk" (SD card in your case) do a write abut once per minute - the "check point" interval Generally these writes are quite small, and over-write the previous one. You can safely increase this time to several minutes (I can't remember which configuration file it is in) to reduce "wear" on the SD card. Given the performance of a Pi I would be comfortable with anything between 5 and 10 minutes (300 to 600 seconds).
As a rough guide - on my PC Einstein is using about 40Mb, running a single task, so not a mega use of disk, but that may increase as the task proceeds.

Most applications write to the "disk" (SD card in your case) do a write abut once per minute - the "check point" interval Generally these writes are quite small, and over-write the previous one. You can safely increase this time to several minutes (I can't remember which configuration file it is in) to reduce "wear" on the SD card. Given the performance of a Pi I would be comfortable with anything between 5 and 10 minutes (300 to 600 seconds).
As a rough guide - on my PC Einstein is using about 40Mb, running a single task, so not a mega use of disk, but that may increase as the task proceeds.

I would second that. Especially if you're using very little RAM anyway.
Another alternative may be, if you could, to use the USB port and to run a flash drive, or SSD instead.
Sandisk A1 micro SD cards also are much faster, as they have a controller built on board. They also won't wear out very quickly, so it's a worthy upgrade.

Lastly, you can overclock the Pi by quite a bit, even if you're only raising the voltage to 2.
mine ran stable at 1085Mhz (1095Mhz with larger heat sink) up from 700Mhz stock, sd_ram frequency of 533Mhz and a core frequency of around 550Mhz
With an overvoltage setting of 2, it's safe to say that the Pi Zero (especially newer models) can run 1,05 Ghz quite well. an SD RAM frequency of 500Mhz, and a core frequency of around 500Mhz;
or use a safer setting of 1Ghz CPU, 450Mhz SD RAM, and 333Mhz core frequency.

You can also overclock the GPU to 530-550Mhz with heatsink (up from the default 250Mhz), but even a safer 500 or 333Mhz is a noticeable improvement.
Only if you have found WUs that can use the Pi's IGP to process data.
If not, overclocking the GPU won't do much, as the IGP will automatically default to the lowest frequency, especially if ran from a non GUI OS (terminal).