Pointers and linked lists in electric power distribution circuit analysis

Electric power distribution circuit analysis programs must efficiently manage a large quantity of system and equipment data. Utility engineers now wish to use integrated software packages with several functions that work efficiently and share data. The use of data structures stored in linked lists and processed through pointers is described. The pointers and linked lists compact the data storage and reduce algorithm execution times. Various algorithms can share data management and graphics functions, decreasing the cost of enhancing and maintaining the code. The approach has been applied to a software package that integrates graphics, data management, analysis, and design algorithms. Several graduate students have developed algorithms as thesis projects, working with the same linked-list data structures