Performance Evaluation of Computer and Communication Systems

By Jean-Yves Le Boudec

Performance evaluation is a critical stage of software- and hardware-system development that every computer engineer and scientist should master. Although complex - requiring skills in mathematics, measurement techniques and simulation - performance evaluation is primarily an art; indeed, the most difficult stage in a performance analysis is defining the approach: once you know what to do, it is less difficult to define a plan of attack with your familiar software tools. We present a set of topics, which we believe should be part of every engineer's intellectual toolkit. This includes the statistical exploitation of numerical results in an efficient and ethical way, for example: how to summarize variability or fairness; what transient removal in a simulation is; and how to make predictions from a time series. We also present well-known performance patterns, which helps to quickly bring the engineer to the main issues. For queuing theory, we focus on a subset of very useful results, such as operational laws. A highlight of the book is the development of Palm calculus, also called ? the importance of the viewpoint, ? which is central to queuing theory. Indeed, this topic has so many applications to simulation and to system analysis in general that it is a very good time investment. This book began as a set of lecture notes for a course given at EPFL.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1439849927
• ISBN13: 9781439849927
• Release Date: April 2021
• Publisher: Epfl Press
• Length: 426 Pages
• Weight: 1.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.5" x 9.7"