November 9, 2010

8:30 – 9:30      Registration and Continental Breakfast

9:30 – 10:30    How to Build Tabular Dashboards using Proc Report

                        Speakers:  Frank Bereznay, IBM and Shana Bereznay, ACS

Frank and Shana will present a SAS based coding framework to develop tabular dashboards using Proc Report. A tabular dashboard is a two dimensional matrix of metric values with left hand columns to name and group resources.  Tabular data provides for discrete data points and at the same time a dense presentation format.  Dashboard capabilities include threshold based traffic lighting of data elements, drilldown capabilities and automated notification for exceptions.  Macro tools are used to simplify the coding required.

10:45 – 11:45 How not to run a performance benchmark

Speaker:  Jaqui Lynch, Forsythe Systems

Jaqui’s presentation will look at some of the benchmarks available in the public domain for testing Unix performance. It will then look at the mistakes people make when setting up to perform benchmarks and will finish with some comments on sizing in general and sizing studies.

11:45 ‑ 12:45  NCCMG Business Meeting/Elections/Lunch Sponsored by Compuware/Vendor Presentation

12:45 – 2:00    Automatic Generation of Benchmark and Test Workloads

Speaker:  Dr. Jozo Dujmović, San Francisco State University

It is realistic to expect that the majority of future benchmark and test workloads will be automatically generated using benchmark program generators. According to Moore's law the memory capacity and the performance/price ratio exponentially grow doubling each 12-18 months. Consequently, industrial benchmarks that are used for measuring computer performance should continuously and strictly follow the exponential growth of computer performance. That goal cannot be achieved using natural workloads that are updated once in several years.  

The goal of this tutorial is to present methods and tools for automatic generation of benchmark and test workloads. In addition, the tutorial will include live demos of automatic generation of large programs (2 million LOC), program calibration, and the use of generated programs for performance analysis of modern compilers.

2:15 – 3:15      TBD

Speaker:  TBD, Compuware Corporation

Please pre-register by contacting Keith McAndrew at (916) 715-8352 by Friday November 5, 2010. Registration is $25.

Report from the August 2010 meeting:

   Speakers:  Joe Brockert, Adrian Cockcroft, Tom Halinski

Call for speakers in 2011. If you are interested in speaking, call Cathy Nolan at (925) 675-5308 or (925) 890-8390.

If you have not attended a meeting within the last two years, you will be deleted from the mailing list.  To remain on the mailing list, either attend one meeting or email cathy.nolan@bankofamerica.com by November 1, 2010.