By, Doug Carruthers 
LoopLink took a page out of the Daft Punk playbook this week and got Harder/Better/Faster/Stronger. After our Major Update of 2013 we found a few performance issues that turned out to be more than just hardware limitations. Generally, most users were not significantly impacted but the slow response could compound very quickly for multi-zone fixed, length projects and in some cases could lock a project out for real time updating.
Fixed length mode intensified the issue because of the nature of what needs to be done in order to calculate a fixed length. For those following along at home in their IGSHPA RLC Manual, you know that the calculation of loop length is dependent on several variables many of which are co-dependent. As a result, there is no mathematical straight line from a targeted loop length to a resultant entering water temperature.
So, LoopLink guesses entering water temperatures (EWTs)… checks if it was right and then systematically improves the answer until a close answer (typically plus or minus 5ft) is found. For each guess, LoopLink has to evaluate every heat pump in every zone and then check the lengths. Add multiple zones and multiple users and boy, that escalates quickly.
In order to improve the efficiency of this process, we had to look for ways to eliminate processes and streamline calculations. In our hunt, we made substantial changes to our core bin-analysis logic and completely revamped fixed length mode. The final result is a 30% average reduction in page response times and an improvement in the overall accuracy of fixed length calculations.
Larger projects using fixed length mode will still take some time to converge on an answer but everything is faster than it once was. Hour after hour, our work is never over and LoopLink will continue to improve.
Check out some ideas on how to use fixed length mode a little more effectively.