Computer Systems Performance Evaluation And Prediction

Table of contents

Computer Systems Organization -- Performance of Systems.

Performance Evaluation, Prediction and Visualization in Parallel Systems presents a comprehensive and systematic discussion of theoretics, methods, techniques and tools for performance evaluation, prediction and visualization of parallel systems. Chapter 1 gives a short overview of performance degradation of parallel systems, and presents a general discussion on the importance of performance evaluation, prediction and visualization of parallel systems. Chapter 2 analyzes and defines several kinds of serial and parallel runtime, points out some of the weaknesses of parallel speedup metrics, and discusses how to improve and generalize them. Chapter 3 describes formal definitions of scalability, addresses the basic metrics affecting the scalability of parallel systems, discusses scalability of parallel systems from three aspects: parallel architecture, parallel algorithm and parallel algorithm-architecture combinations, and analyzes the relations of scalability and speedup. Chapter 4 discusses the methodology of performance measurement, describes the benchmark- oriented performance test and analysis and how to measure speedup and scalability in practice. Chapter 5 analyzes the difficulties in performance prediction, discusses application-oriented and architecture-oriented performance prediction and how to predict speedup and scalability in practice. Chapter 6 discusses performance visualization techniques and tools for parallel systems from three stages: performance data collection, performance data filtering and performance data visualization, and classifies the existing performance visualization tools. Chapter 7 describes parallel compiling-based, search-based and knowledge-based performance debugging, which assists programmers to optimize the strategy or algorithm in their parallel programs, and presents visual programming-based performance debugging to help programmers identify the location and cause of the performance problem. It also provides concrete suggestions on how to modify their parallel program to improve the performance. Chapter 8 gives an overview of current interconnection networks for parallel systems, analyzes the scalability of interconnection networks, and discusses how to measure and improve network performances. Performance Evaluation, Prediction and Visualization in Parallel Systems serves as an excellent reference for researchers, and may be used as a text for advanced courses on the topic.

This book is written for computer engineers and scientists active in the development of software and hardware systems. It supplies the understanding and tools needed to effectively evaluate the performance of individual computer and communication systems. It covers the theoretical foundations of the field as well as specific software packages being employed by leaders in the field.

In this book, Krishna Kant provides a completely up-to-date treatment of the fundamental techniques of computer system performance modeling and evaluation. He discusses measurement, simulation, and analysis, and places a strong emphasis on analysis by including such topics as basic and advanced queuing theory, product form networks, aggregation, decomposition, performance bounds, and various forms of approximations. Applications involving synchronization between various activities are presented in a chapter on Petri net-based performance modeling, and a final chapter covers a wide range of problems involving steady state analysis, transient analysis, and optimization.

Capacity Planning for Computer Systems covers the principles, concepts, and practical application of capacity planning to computer systems. This book is divided into nine chapters and begins with an introduction to the foundation and metrics of capacity planning. The subsequent chapters deal with the business elements, service levels, forecasting, and predictions of capacity planning, along with the regression techniques, forecast monitoring, and revision for the field. The remaining chapters highlight the applications of capacity planning, including in systems optimization, computer disk, tape, and tape drive. These chapters also provide the charting and graphics presentations for capacity planning. This book will be of value to computer scientists and researchers.

A book for experts and practitioners, emphasizing the intuition and reasoning behind definitions and derivations related to evaluating computer systems performance.