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.

Table of contents

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.

This volume contains the complete set of tutorial papers presented at the 16th IFIP (International Federation for Information Processing) Working Group 7.3 International Symposium on Computer Performance Modelling, Measurement and Evaluation, and a number of tutorial papers presented at the 1993 ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) Special Interest Group METRICS Conference on Measurement and Modeling of Computer Systems. The principal goal of the volume is to present an overview of recent results in the field of modeling and performance evaluation of computer and communication systems. The wide diversity of applications and methodologies included in the tutorials attests to the breadth and richness of current research in the area of performance modeling. The tutorials may serve to introduce a reader to an unfamiliar research area, to unify material already known, or simply to illustrate the diversity of research in the field. The extensive bibliographies guide readers to additional sources for further reading.

Intended for a first course in performance evaluation, this is a self-contained treatment covering all aspects of queuing theory. It starts by introducing readers to the terminology and usefulness of queueing theory and continues by considering Markovian queues in equilibrium, Littles law, reversibility, transient analysis, and computation, plus the M/G/1 queuing system. It then moves on to cover networks of queues, and concludes with techniques for numerical solutions, a discussion of the PANACEA technique, discrete time queueing systems and simulation, and stochastic Petri networks. The whole is backed by case studies of distributed queueing networks arising in industrial applications. This third edition includes a new chapter on self-similar traffic, many new problems, and solutions for many exercises.

This new edition continues to emphasize the use of data envelopment analysis (DEA) to create optimization-based benchmarks within hospitals, physician group practices, health maintenance organizations, nursing homes and other health care delivery organizations. Suitable for graduate students learning DEA applications in health care as well as for practicing administrators, it is divided into two sections covering methods and applications. Section I considers efficiency evaluations using DEA; returns to scale; weight restricted (multiplier) models; non-oriented or slack-based models, including in this edition two versions of non-controllable variable models and categorical variable models; longitudinal (panel) evaluations and the effectiveness dimension of performance evaluation. A new chapter then looks at new and advanced models of DEA, including super-efficiency, congestion DEA, network DEA, and dynamic network models. Mathematical formulations of various DEA models are placed in end-of-chapter appendices. Section II then looks at health care applications within particular settings, chapter-by-chapter, including hospitals, physician practices, nursing homes and health maintenance organizations (HMOs). Other chapters then explore home health care and home health agencies; dialysis centers, community mental health centers, community-based your services, organ procurement organizations, aging agencies and dental providers; DEA models to evaluate provider performance for specific treatments, including stroke, mechanical ventilation and perioperative services. A new chapter then examines international-country-based applications of DEA in health care in 16 different countries, along with OECD and multi-country studies. Most of the existing chapters in this section were expanded with recent applications. Included with the book is online access to a learning version of DEA Solver software, written by Professor Kaoru Tone, which can solve up to 50 DMUs for various DEA models listed in the User’s Guide at the end of the book.

Progressing towards sustainable development raises important challenges to conducting performance evaluations in governments because there are neither generally accepted methods nor specific standards to be met at present. Sustainability Performance Evaluation System in Government, makes a conceptual contribution to public sustainability performance evaluation and develops a set of framework indicators with the help of the strategic and comprehensive approach “Sustainability Balanced Scorecard”. As a conceptual basis for the further research and application, this volume will be of great interest to researchers and practitioners at many levels of environmental / sustainability, public management and strategic control studies. Evaluators will find methodological approaches and applied tools for their work. Decision-makers and managers will find it valuable to manage the social, economic and environmental issues in a balanced and integrated manner. Governments will also find it helpful in assisting them in establishing an evaluation system towards sustainable development.