Currently, the BLMM code does not utilize the sparsity of a LMM. The primary reason for this is that, unfortunately, in Python, there is not a strong ecosystem for sparse matrix operations. The only sparse solve implementation is available in the package cvxopt and the only package working towards broadcasting sparse matrix operations is sparse. However, it is early days for sparse.
In future, as the python ecosytem develops, it would be good for BLMM to account for the sparse nature of the LMM. At time of writing, however, this does not seem possible.
Currently, the BLMM code does not utilize the sparsity of a LMM. The primary reason for this is that, unfortunately, in Python, there is not a strong ecosystem for sparse matrix operations. The only sparse solve implementation is available in the package
cvxoptand the only package working towards broadcasting sparse matrix operations issparse. However, it is early days forsparse.In future, as the python ecosytem develops, it would be good for BLMM to account for the sparse nature of the LMM. At time of writing, however, this does not seem possible.