Client, Manager, API, docker_wrapper: support network access from apps

[davidpanderson]

The goal of this PR is to allow apps that do network communication
to work properly in the presence of network outages and suspension.
With these changes:

• If a job that needs network (such as a docker job) runs while
  the network is disconnected, it figures this out, tells the client,
  and the user is shown a notice suggesting that they reconnect.

• If such a job needs network and network access is suspended by the user
  (via time-of-day prefs or the 'suspend network' command)
  it sees this, tells the client that it needs to communicate,
  and the user is shown a notice suggesting that they unsuspend.

This requires some logic in apps; this PR adds this to docker_wrapper.

This is described here:
https://github.com/BOINC/boinc/wiki/Apps-that-do-network-communication

Note: in ~2004 there was an unsuccessful effort to run Folding@home
as a BOINC app, and we added logic where the client is responsible
for knowing whether a connection exists, and it notifies the app.
This PR removes this logic; in the new design it's up to the app
to detect the absence of a connection.

Remove an API where the app tells the client how much data it transferred.
This info isn't used, and in the case of Docker the app doesn't know
how much data was transferred.

---

Summary by cubic

Apps can now tell the client when they’re waiting for Internet, and the UI shows clear notices and a “Waiting for network” task state. docker_wrapper detects outages, retries image builds until connectivity returns, and surfaces better errors.

• New Features

  • API: added boinc_waiting_for_network(bool); app status always includes <want_network>; removed boinc_need_network(), boinc_network_poll(), boinc_network_done(), boinc_network_usage().
  • Client/Manager: shows notices when tasks need Internet or network is suspended; tracks connection vs. suspension notices separately and clears them on reconnection or when no tasks want network; GUI shows “Waiting for network”; GUI RPC exposes want_network; don’t strip tags in notices; removed unused bytes sent/received tracking.
  • docker_wrapper: waits for a heartbeat before checking suspend state; detects disconnect/suspension, sets want_network, and retries image builds until network returns; checks connectivity via ping to berkeley.edu; honors exit/abort while waiting; prints network-related logs only with verbose flags; shows command output on errors; uses --retry 0 for Podman builds; on Windows, copies the command string before CreateProcess.
  • Work fetch: piggyback requests no longer skip higher‑priority projects that previously returned no jobs.
  • Lib: run_command() returns non‑zero on command failures and (on Windows) still returns command output; added network_connected().

• Migration

  • Replace removed APIs with boinc_waiting_for_network(bool).
  • Apps should detect connectivity and call boinc_waiting_for_network(true/false); include <want_network> in status updates.

^{Written for commit cbe058e. Summary will update on new commits. Review in cubic}

[cubic-dev-ai]

3 issues found across 25 files

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[Copilot]

Pull request overview

This PR updates the BOINC client/app interface and UI to support applications that require network access during execution, particularly handling (1) physical disconnection and (2) user-suspended network access. It also removes legacy app→client network-usage accounting and the older client→app “network available” signaling design.

Changes:

• Add an app-driven “waiting for network” signal (boinc_waiting_for_network() / <want_network>) and expose it via GUI RPC/Manager UI (“Waiting for network”).
• Update client network-status logic and notices to reflect tasks needing network, and remove legacy network-availability signaling and byte accounting.
• Extend docker_wrapper to detect network unavailability/suspension during image build and to report “waiting for network”.

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 25 out of 25 changed files in this pull request and generated 3 comments.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
samples/example_app/uc2.cpp	Removes the sample’s deprecated boinc_network_usage() option.
samples/docker_wrapper/docker_wrapper.cpp	Adds “waiting for network” handling during image build; refactors output parsing helpers.
samples/docker_wrapper/checkpoint_notes	Moves checkpoint/restart notes out of the C++ source.
lib/util.h	Updates run_command() signature to accept const char*.
lib/util.cpp	Updates run_command() signature definition accordingly.
lib/network.h	Adds network_connected() declaration and centralizes addr_len() helper.
lib/network.cpp	Implements network_connected() using ping.
lib/gui_rpc_client.h	Adds RESULT::want_network field for GUI RPC consumers.
lib/gui_rpc_client.cpp	Removes duplicate addr_len() helper (now in lib/network.h).
lib/gui_rpc_client_ops.cpp	Parses/clears want_network in GUI RPC result parsing.
clientgui/MainDocument.cpp	Shows “Waiting for network” in task status text.
client/result.h	Removes stored per-task final bytes sent/received fields.
client/result.cpp	Removes read/write of per-task final bytes sent/received in state output.
client/net_stats.h	Replaces show_ref_message with network_notice_active gating.
client/net_stats.cpp	Uses new some_task_wants_network() and adjusts notice clearing paths.
client/gui_http.h	Clarifies GUI_HTTP responsibilities in comments.
client/cs_notice.cpp	Removes additional network-related notices when clearing network messages.
client/client_state.h	Updates/expands network-related notice strings.
client/client_msgs.cpp	Adjusts msg_printf() to mark messages as non-HTML.
client/app.h	Removes legacy network byte accounting; redefines want_network semantics; renames task-set query.
client/app.cpp	Removes active-task network byte output; adds <want_network/> to GUI output; renames task-set query impl.
client/app_start.cpp	Removes resetting of removed per-episode byte counters.
client/app_control.cpp	Removes parsing of byte counters; adds notice logic for <want_network>.
api/boinc_api.h	Replaces legacy network APIs with boinc_waiting_for_network(bool).
api/boinc_api.cpp	Implements boinc_waiting_for_network() and includes <want_network> in app-status messages.

---

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[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 25 out of 25 changed files in this pull request and generated 1 comment.

Comments suppressed due to low confidence (1)

client/app_control.cpp:1370

• new_want_network is initialized to -1 and want_network is no longer reset to 0 before parsing. Because the API only emits <want_network> when true, the tag will be absent when the app clears the condition, leaving new_want_network == -1 and preventing want_network from ever being cleared. Treat a missing <want_network> tag as 0 (e.g., initialize to 0 / restore reset-to-0 behavior) or have the API always send an explicit 0/1 value.

    int new_want_network = -1;
    current_cpu_time = checkpoint_cpu_time = 0.0;
    if (parse_double(msg_buf, "<fraction_done>", fd)) {
        // fraction_done will be reported as zero
        // until the app's first call to boinc_fraction_done().

[AenBleidd]

@davidpanderson, can we have reference site configurable via cc_config.xml?
I personally don't care but some might not want to send any statistics to any corporate website (even via ping request).
It's ok to fallback to google.com if there is no site configured, but it would be nice to give users a choice.
See this ticket for reference.

[davidpanderson]

I added this (using the test_network_url that we already have in nvc_config.xml)

[AenBleidd]

@davidpanderson, please validate this logic. I believe you should return retval here

[davidpanderson]

Yup. Cubic caught that too.

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 25 out of 25 changed files in this pull request and generated 2 comments.

Comments suppressed due to low confidence (2)

lib/util.cpp:318

• Changing run_command() to take const char* is unsafe on Windows: CreateProcess() requires a writable command-line buffer (it may modify it), but the implementation casts away const ((LPTSTR)cmd). Callers can now legally pass string literals (e.g. network_connected() does), which can lead to undefined behavior/crashes. Either keep the parameter as char* (enforcing mutability) or make an internal writable copy before calling CreateProcess().

int run_command(const char *cmd, vector<string> &out) {
    out.clear();
#ifdef _WIN32
    HANDLE pipe_read, pipe_write;
    SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES sa;
    STARTUPINFO si;
    PROCESS_INFORMATION pi;

    memset(&si, 0, sizeof(si));
    memset(&pi, 0, sizeof(pi));
    memset(&sa, 0, sizeof(sa));

    sa.nLength = sizeof(SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES);
    sa.bInheritHandle = TRUE;
    sa.lpSecurityDescriptor = NULL;

    if (!CreatePipe(&pipe_read, &pipe_write, &sa, 0)) return -1;
    SetHandleInformation(pipe_read, HANDLE_FLAG_INHERIT, 0);

    si.cb = sizeof(STARTUPINFO);
    si.dwFlags |= STARTF_FORCEOFFFEEDBACK | STARTF_USESHOWWINDOW | STARTF_USESTDHANDLES;
    si.wShowWindow = SW_HIDE;
    si.hStdOutput = pipe_write;
    si.hStdError = pipe_write;
    si.hStdInput = NULL;

    if (!CreateProcess(
        NULL,
        (LPTSTR)cmd,
        NULL,

lib/util.cpp:376

• network_connected() relies on run_command() returning nonzero when ping fails, but on Unix run_command() ignores the command’s exit status (it calls pclose(fp) but doesn’t check its return value). As a result, network_connected() will almost always report “connected” on Unix even when ping fails. Consider checking the pclose() status (e.g. WEXITSTATUS) and returning an error when the command exits nonzero.

int run_command(const char *cmd, vector<string> &out) {
    out.clear();
#ifdef _WIN32
    HANDLE pipe_read, pipe_write;
    SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES sa;
    STARTUPINFO si;
    PROCESS_INFORMATION pi;

    memset(&si, 0, sizeof(si));
    memset(&pi, 0, sizeof(pi));
    memset(&sa, 0, sizeof(sa));

    sa.nLength = sizeof(SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES);
    sa.bInheritHandle = TRUE;
    sa.lpSecurityDescriptor = NULL;

    if (!CreatePipe(&pipe_read, &pipe_write, &sa, 0)) return -1;
    SetHandleInformation(pipe_read, HANDLE_FLAG_INHERIT, 0);

    si.cb = sizeof(STARTUPINFO);
    si.dwFlags |= STARTF_FORCEOFFFEEDBACK | STARTF_USESHOWWINDOW | STARTF_USESTDHANDLES;
    si.wShowWindow = SW_HIDE;
    si.hStdOutput = pipe_write;
    si.hStdError = pipe_write;
    si.hStdInput = NULL;

    if (!CreateProcess(
        NULL,
        (LPTSTR)cmd,
        NULL,
        NULL,
        TRUE,   // inherit handles
        CREATE_NO_WINDOW,
        NULL,
        NULL,
        &si,
        &pi
    )) {
        return -1;
    }

    // wait for command to finish
    //
    WaitForSingleObject(pi.hProcess, INFINITE);

    unsigned long exit_code;
    GetExitCodeProcess(pi.hProcess, &exit_code);
    if (exit_code) return -1;

    DWORD count, nread;
    PeekNamedPipe(pipe_read, NULL, NULL, NULL, &count, NULL);
    if (count == 0) {
        return 0;
    }
    char* buf = (char*)malloc(count+1);
    if (!ReadFile(pipe_read, buf, count, &nread, NULL)) {
        free(buf);
        return -1;
    }
    buf[nread] = 0;
    char* p = buf;
    while (*p) {
        char* q = strchr(p, '\n');
        if (!q) break;
        out.push_back(string(p, q-p+1));    // include \n
        p = q + 1;
    }
    free(buf);
#else
#ifndef _USING_FCGI_
    char buf[256];
    errno = 0;
    FILE* fp = popen(cmd, "r");
    if (!fp) {
        fprintf(stderr, "popen() failed: %s\n", cmd);
        return ERR_FOPEN;
    }
    while (fgets(buf, 256, fp)) {
        out.push_back(buf);
    }
    pclose(fp);
    if (errno) {
        fprintf(stderr, "popen() failed errno %d: %s\n", errno, cmd);
        return -1;
    }
#endif
#endif
    return 0;

[cubic-dev-ai]

3 issues found across 8 files (changes from recent commits).

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[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 29 out of 29 changed files in this pull request and generated 6 comments.

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 29 out of 29 changed files in this pull request and generated 5 comments.

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Copilot reviewed 29 out of 29 changed files in this pull request and generated 8 comments.