I run DreamLab on two old iPhones and a not-oft used iPad 24/7, as well as my main iPhone just at night. I have a MacBook Pro 2017, so it has an Intel processor. Previously DreamLab was only available for Apple Silicon Chipped Macs. I went to check just to see if I could have this running on my Mac and lo and behold, it was available for me to download! I loaded it up and started running it and it runs without issue. It uses little CPU that I don't notice when it's running whatsoever.
A few things I would like addressed for the Macs/iPhones as well as the this app project in general:
-I would like an option on Macs to be able to utilize GPUs if possible. I realize this would likely require a lot of work. Right now it is most probably a ported app from iOS that was tweaked enough to run on an Intel Mac. If GPU could be used on the Intel Macs as well as Apple Silicon Macs, that would speed up research considerably. I would also like to be able to choose how much CPU I give DreamLab. I often times am doing tasks that require maybe 10% computing power total. While this is plugged in (only way for it to even run) I am having about 40-80% of my CPU not being utilized. I could crank out a whole lot more calculations this way. Volunteers have also expressed on Reddit that they would like to have an option to increase computing percentage on their old iPhones. I know my old iPhone X computes very slowly compared to an old iPhone 6S. I am pretty sure that is due to the efficiency cores in the iPhone X's A10 Fusion chip. Apple has baked in protections to keep the phones from overheating. You could allow more CPU power to be used and the iPhones would automatically throttle down if they got too hot.
-As for this app in general, there are many things that need addressed to make this a more productive research tool. Allow users to have either a profile, link DreamLab to AppleID, or have it linked to Apple GameCenter (for stat tracking). Many users have complained on Reddit and the iOS App Store about this lack of progress keeping. If you uninstall DreamLab and reinstall it, all the previous history of calculations is gone. That's very disheartening to see. No, it doesn't affect the research which is the point of DreamLab, but it definitely hurts a user who is proud to see how much they are contributing to this research. I would also like to see a progress bar for each calculation, similar to the hugely popular BOINC client for desktops. That is just something that shows more use than just a number and the running time. It's similar to any type of progress bar when installing a program, an app, loading a webpage even, anything like that. That is good UI which is why its across all platforms and interfaces. Lastly, the communication from Vodafone needs some serious work. The COVID project is in Phase 5 and it is the same copy and pasted information as when the project first started back in 2020. That's pretty unacceptable that someone couldn't have taken a few hours at most to revamp the info and to give its volunteers some progress updates on what exactly their free computing power has been doing. BOINC is extremely communicative with its projects and volunteers appreciate that. Volunteers are known to drop projects when the communication goes cold. We also would like some updates on the new Climate Change project that was announced some months ago that is being evaluated for consideration. Many of us would love to start that type of project. Vodafone: This would be IMMENSELY helpful to the work you are doing. Just some more communication would have volunteers more likely to stick around and have their friends/families join the cause. Please consider making an effort to increase communication, as well as making the aforementioned changes in the projects.
