Anna Macijeski

The person who did the cover design for my book has her own website where you can see her beautiful art and graphic design work.  http://www.annamacijeski.com/

The Slowest Line And You

This article in Wired is a lovely summary of where queueing theory came from, why mathematicians are troublesome hotel guests, and why you always end up in the slowest line at your local Megamart.

Read this.

What’s Up With That: Why You Always Seem to Choose the Slowest Line

 

Tuning Chocolate Chip Cookies

In most computer performance work, big changes (both good and bad) can result from small adjustments. In the blog posts below, you’ll find someone who has done some excellent experimental science as she adjusts the tuning on a chocolate chip cookie recipe. She starts with a control recipe (Nestle Tollhouse Chocolate Chip Cookie) and she varies one thing at a time and makes a batch. She shows her work, details the techniques, and keeps excellent notes.

So why is a blog on computer performance linking to a cooking blog? Because the things I write about here are the things that will always be true on any computer system. Good experimental technique will always be useful and I’m pretty sure that a huge fraction of people will always gratefully accept a well made chocolate chip cookie. Her work is a delicious example of good science, which is an essential ingredient of all computer performance work.

The Ultimate Guide to Chocolate Chip Cookies – Part 1
The Ultimate Guide to Chocolate Chip Cookies – Part 2
The Ultimate Guide to Chocolate Chip Cookies – Part 3
The Ultimate Guide to Chocolate Chip Cookies – Part 4

 

Astrophysics Anyone?

As a hopeless science geek I’m enjoying the heck out of reading: Starts With A Bang! by Ethan Siegal – Science writer, astrophysicist, science communicator & NASA columnistEthan Siegel

Mark Tomlinson’s Performance Blog

Mark Tomlinson’s Performance Blog

Dig deep.  This blog contains good performance and testing insights in every year. Some of it is serious, some of it is big-picture, and then there is this: An Atari-class, music video on the wonderfulness of testing with music by group They Might be Giants.

CMG India

A lot of my readers are from India. Since it is always good to support the home team, I’d like to point out there is a CMG India site http://www.cmgindia.org/ with some good performance links and information you might find valuable.

Steve Souders’ Book

If you are doing any performance work on web sites, you should read Steve Souders’ book. It is beautifully written, and wildly useful.

He also has a blog at: http://www.stevesouders.com/blog/ 

Link

Practical Performance Analyst

This site has much to offer those interested in computer performance work. The person who runs it is remarkably dedicated to making good information available and is also a very nice person. Full disclosure: I have contributed content to the site.