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<DIV><FONT size=3>A couple comments on those of others ... fuel for the fire, or
stir up the hornets</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800000 size=3>Quote: "First let me state that from all
available evidence, the whole DOE (and here DOE is the name of the program -
what a strange choice for program name, BTW) effort is one of the most
successful undertakings in a brief history of computer program development and
represent well spent government dollars by any standard."</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Comment: First, all the contributors to DOE-2 thank you for your kind
words.</DIV>
<DIV>The name was chosen, against developers advice, by USDOE, shortly after
the</DIV>
<DIV>creation of the Department, to replace the programs existing name;
previously</DIV>
<DIV>the program was named CalERDA for the Calif. and ERDA (one org.
moved</DIV>
<DIV>into the new DOE) who supplied the early funds. DOE-1, DOE-2,
DOE-2.0A,</DIV>
<DIV>DOE-2.1A, DOE-2.1B and DOE-2.1C (1977-1986) were mostly paid for by</DIV>
<DIV>DOE with small contributions from others. DOE-2.1D (~1988) had
smallish</DIV>
<DIV>percentage of private contribution. DOE-2.1E (~1994) was about half
private</DIV>
<DIV>contribution (mostly my company) and DOE-2.2 (current) is mostly
private</DIV>
<DIV>contribution (mostly my company). DOE-2 would not have come into
existence</DIV>
<DIV>without the State and Federal government very large investment;
surprisingly large</DIV>
<DIV>compared to similar private projects of the time; comparing public vs.
private</DIV>
<DIV>contributions must be done using project output not $ input.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>DOE-X only "took off" after private firms adopted and invested heavily:
first</DIV>
<DIV>just PC ports like the defunct SI, Inc turned into Acrosoft, and ADM; then
our</DIV>
<DIV>PC ports with many new HVAC/Economics/EndUseReporting 2.1E versions;</DIV>
<DIV>then interfaces Comply24, VisualDOE, EZ-DOE, etc. This ivestment only
happens</DIV>
<DIV>if firms can make $ from such efforts. Such return on investment is
not possible</DIV>
<DIV>unless licensing gives those investing the time and $ the ability to
benefit from their</DIV>
<DIV>investment.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>So, we owe DOE and CA/CEC thanks for making it possible that DOE-x exists,
but</DIV>
<DIV>owe the thanks to the private sector companies that took the somewhat
deflated</DIV>
<DIV>ball, added much air (hot at times) and ran with it.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800000 size=3>Quote: "It seems to me that there is a quite a
bit of confusion about PowerDOE, which is in my opinion, very good
program. PowerDOE is nothing more than good pre and post processor, which
can have DOE 2.2 or EnergyPlus as underlying engine."</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>Comment: Again, the PowerDOE development team thanks you for
the kind words.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>PowerDOE interface code was developed by my company with $
only from EPRI</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>and our own investment (85% vs. 15%). LBNL participated, with
many other</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>organizations, in design meetings for the PowerDOE user
interface. The PowerDOE</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>interface is not just a "pre and post processor" for DOE-2; it
is a full interactive</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>implementation of DOE-2's BDL processor (which is somewhat of
a table driven</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>table generator whose internal design is only applicable to
just DOE-X, but any</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>application that requires extensive input organized into
object tables.) Editing</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>PowerDOE data screens is editing BDL memory in real time
including the dynamic</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>recalculation of parameter defaults (like a very large
spreadsheet with a formula in</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>every cell; thus the slow down - geometric- as problems get
very large.) The</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>PowerDOE name was suggested by LBNL as they did not like our
original winDOE</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>name; PowerDOE name was okayed by DOE, then accepted and
trademarked by</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>EPRI (oops! - an poor choice of move motivated by political
infighting amoungst the</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>EPRI/DOE/LBNL/JJH team). I have licensed the use of the
name and EPRI owned</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>interface code from EPRI for further development and
commercial distribution.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800000><FONT size=3>Quote: "<FONT face=Arial><SPAN
class=718322318-27012000>EnergyPlus is an open source program, and alpha version
is just being released. For measly $100 (I think) anybody can get license
agreement and build commercial strength pre and post-processor to
it. "</SPAN></FONT></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><FONT color=#0000ff face=Arial size=2><SPAN
class=718322318-27012000></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>Comment: EnergyPlus is NOT open
source; but it should be, in my opinion, using UC's</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>(LBNL is managed by UC for DOE)
own BSD (Unix) type license since it is developed</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>(almost?) entirely using public
funds. Why a fee; why not freeware like our basic
DOE-2</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>versions? No published
distribution licenses yet; and if these become available and have
a</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>per copy royalty, there can be
no freeware products that are EnergyPlus based unless LBNL</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>does them - in which case why
would any private sector firm invest the time and $ to
compete</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>against the government
funds. We could adapt both the PowerDOE and eQUEST
(freeware)</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>interfaces to EnergyPlus in a
straight forward manner fairly quickly; we cannot do this
without</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>open source licensing and a
working, supported (commercially viable) complete product -
a</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>couple years away at best. I'm
sure Eley can do the same with the VisualDOE interface and</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>EnergySoft with EnergyPro and
so on; DOE has no business funding work that so many</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>private firms are already doing
and can do better; a similar argument can be made for</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>DOE's getting out of the engine
business where the result is in "product" form rather
than</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>NMF model library or "component
toolkit" form. The private sector can take the correct</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>next commercial product steps,
better, cheaper and faster (and also provide the required</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><SPAN class=718322318-27012000>product marketing and
support.)</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><FONT color=#0000ff face=Arial size=2><SPAN
class=718322318-27012000></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3><FONT color=#0000ff face=Arial size=2><SPAN
class=718322318-27012000></SPAN></FONT></FONT><FONT color=#800000 size=3>Quote:
"Sorry for the rant, but I'm also getting tired the people who think they
can<BR>purchase Power or Visual DOE and be a DOE2 expert in a week with no
prior<BR>experience -- simulation, HVAC design or otherwise."</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>Comment: we have many eQUEST users after quick, accurate,
"first order" answers</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>doing just what you say is not possible. But I agree
that "specialists" will always be needed</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>to perform accurate, indepth analysis. eQUEST 2.0 will
be released </FONT>within a couple weeks</DIV>
<DIV>(also freeware - and eQUEST 1.2 will be posted Friday); 2.0 will have a
large fraction of</DIV>
<DIV>PowerDOE-like capabilities (2D/3D displays, HVAC diagrams, full DOE-2
details dialogs</DIV>
<DIV>and data editing, table/graphic report pages) and retains improved versions
of the building</DIV>
<DIV>creation and EEM wizards. We want to see thousands doing analysis not
hundreds.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800000 size=3>Quote: "PowerDoe hasn't been very useful for
us. Our buildings tend to be fairly<BR>large with alot of detail, so it is
easy to bring PowerDoe to a crawl on<BR>both the P-pro 200 and PIII 300 machines
we have."</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>Comment: As I mentioned above, PowerDOE is like a
very large spreadsheet with thousands</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>of formula; changing some items in </FONT>a large building
model causes tens of thousand of parameters</DIV>
<DIV>to be recalculated; PowerDOE 1 was developed as a 16-bit application - the
memory sharing</DIV>
<DIV>between the 16-bit interface code and 32-bit interactive BDL suffers from
very large windows</DIV>
<DIV>ALIAS-style memory sharing between processes overhead and the slowness of
32-bit numeric</DIV>
<DIV>calculation in a 16-bit interface environment. eQUEST is fully a
32-bit implementation and thus</DIV>
<DIV>is much faster; eQUEST 2.0 has full BDL details editing. Thus, we
hope to greatly reduce your</DIV>
<DIV>frustrations in the near future.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800000 face=",ëwäö" size=3>Quote: "<SPAN
class=590333521-26012000>One more comment and question - the DOE is spending our
money to create new code and have arguably abandoned the multi-million dollar
investment in previous DOE2.x developent. Is this the best use of taxpayer
money?"</SPAN><BR> <BR></FONT><FONT size=3>Comment: There is an important
role, in my view, for taxpayer $ in this field; it is a good way</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>to get the basic </FONT>models, algorithms, and lab/field
detailed data collection and model validation</DIV>
<DIV>started (and sometimes the only source for this funding for some types of
components.) It is</DIV>
<DIV>a terrible way to get "products" done; DOE-2 became most successful because
private</DIV>
<DIV>companies (and utilities) decided to invest heavily in taking the basic
code to the next level</DIV>
<DIV>so as to be useful and useable by a wide range of "consumers" of the
technology (designers,</DIV>
<DIV>researchers, code officials, etc.) This required heavy investment in
both the "raw" DOE-2</DIV>
<DIV>engine (mostly work done by my company) as well as many interfaces
(GabelDodd</DIV>
<DIV>EnergySoft's EnergyPro, Eley Associates VisualDOE, Elite's EasyDOE, Item
Systems</DIV>
<DIV>DOEPlus, EPRI/JJH's PowerDOE, JJH's eQUEST, DOE/PNL ComCheck-Plus, and
many</DIV>
<DIV>others under development or private offering in specialized markets.)</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#800000 size=3>Quote: "<SPAN class=280442019-27012000><FONT
face=Arial>Perhaps my perceptions of success have been unduly tainted by the
seemingly endless wait for PowerDOE and 2.2"</FONT></SPAN><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3>Comment: Lots could be said here</FONT>, but not worth the
space. In summary, others decided to</DIV>
<DIV>announce the software development and schedule before the basic components
were designed</DIV>
<DIV>and cost estimated or funds wre available to do the work. My company
advised against such</DIV>
<DIV>announcements and never made any prior to 1997 first versions being
available. No matter,</DIV>
<DIV>it is all now out there for you to use; more popwerful but probably new
frustrations and</DIV>
<DIV>even longer "wish lists."</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>---<BR>Jeff Hirsch<BR>James J. Hirsch & Associates<BR>Building
Performance Analysis Software & Consulting<BR>12185 Presilla
Road<BR>Camarillo, CA 93012-9243 USA<BR>phone: (805)
553-9000<BR>fax: (805) 532-2401<BR>email: <A
href="mailto:Jeff.Hirsch@DOE2.com">Jeff.Hirsch@DOE2.com</A><BR>web: <A
href="http://DOE2.com">http://DOE2.com</A></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV><PRE>
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