Recent Technical Improvements to the WINDOW Computer Program

The WINDOW series of computer programs has been used since 1985 to model the thermal and optical properties of windows. Each succeeding version of WINDOW has brought its user base new technical capabilities, improvements to the user interface, and greater accuracy. Technical improvements to the current version, which will be released as version 5, are at first being released as stand-alone programs. This paper summarizes the capabilities and algorithms of two of these programs, THERM and LAMINATE. A third stand alone program, RESFEN, which calculates the annual energy effects of specific windows in a typical house throughout the US, will also be incorporated into WINDOW 5; because this program is already in use and documented, it is not discussed in this paper. THERM allows the user to evaluate two dimensional (2-D) heat transfer effects through the solid elements of a window while LAMINATE determines the optical properties of an individual glazing layer with an applied film. Both of these programs are undergoing final development at the time of this writing and will be released as separate programs before they are incorporated into WINDOW 5.