Join the mIRC SETI Team

An Extra-Terrestial We invite you to join the mIRC SETI Team to participate in a world-wide effort to find E.T.! You, me and all fellow mIRCers can really mean a difference in this project supported by the SETI Institute. The SETI Institute serves as the home for scientific research in the general field of Life in the Universe with an emphasis on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. Their research is designed to answer the question: Are we alone in the Universe?

We hope you like this project as much as we do,
Khaled and Tjerk.

What is SETI@home?

SETI@home is a scientific experiment that harnesses the power of hundreds of thousands of Internet-connected computers in the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence or SETI as part of project Serendip. You can participate by running a program that automagically downloads and analyzes radio telescope data from Puerto Rico's Arecibo Radio Telescope. An excellent explaination about the radio signal we are listening for is found at the SETI@home website. As you will see, there is a small but captivating possibility that your computer will detect the faint murmur of a civilization beyond Earth. And the next step is to chat with them, through mIRC of course ;-)

How does it work?

The idea behind SETI@home is to take advantage of the unused processing cycles of personal computers. The way this would work is as follows: an interested computer owner will download free software from SETI@home. Then, when their computer is idle (for example, when you leave your home office to go out for a burger), this software will download a chunk of data for analysis. The software will start crunching data and display the results on the screens of the users. The results of the analysis are ultimately sent back to SETI@home, combined with the crunched data from the thousands of other SETI@home participants, and used to help in the search for extraterrestrial signals. The tremendous advantage of this scheme is that it permits looking for a variety of signal types that the current processing cannot yet uncover, and tens of thousands of interested folks will become active participants in SETI.

Where do you get the software?

The best way to get the software is to download it directly from SETI@home. This guarantees the most up-to-date version of the software. Installing the software is a blaze. Just like installing mIRC start the small (700 k) installer program you downloaded from SETI@home and you can not go wrong.
The program will ask for your nickname and email address. Both can be kept a secret to others if you want. Your work for the SETI@home project is identified by your email address. Make sure it is valid, your project password will be send to that address.

How to join mIRC's SETI Team?

Just participating in the SETI@home project is great fun already, but working with looots of fellow mIRCers on a combined result is even better! After you have installed and started the SETI@home program (dont you like to see your PC doing some work!) you have to subscribe to the mIRC SETI Team at the SETI@home website. Simply click the Join this Team link, and fill in your SETI@home account info; your email address and password. If you didnt recieve your SETI@home password yet, use the special form to request for it. After this procedure you are a mIRC SETI Team member and you will see your results on the mIRC SETI Team statistics page.

Welcome to our Team!

What if you want to articipate anonymously?

If, for whatever reason, you feel you want to participate but not with your own name or email address, you can participate anonymously by using our general email address. In the Welcome and SignUp dialog in the software just select the 'Login to Existing Account' option. This will ask you to fill in the email address of an existing SETI@home account. You can use our seti@mirc.com address. This is all info the program needs to understand you want to share your work with all others in the mIRC Team. There is no need to go to the SETI@home website to subscribe to the team this way. The program will display the mIRC SETI Team info in its User Info section.

Where do we meet?

On IRC of course! On #mIRC, and there is a special IRC Channel on EFnet, called #SETI@home. All implications of finding E.T. and his friends are discussed there. You can also share eventual problems with the SETI@home program there with other data crunchers! There is an Unofficial SETI Forum on the Web as well.