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Vol: 53(67) No: 3 / September 2008

Improving Distributed Systems Design by Simulation-Based Performance Analysis. A Case Study.
Cosmina Chise
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, “Politehnica” University of Timisoara, Faculty of Automation and Computers, 2 V. Parvan Blvd, Timişoara, Romania, e-mail: cosmina.chise@cs.upt.ro
Ioan Jurca
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, “Politehnica” University of Timisoara, Faculty of Automation and Computers, 2 V. Parvan Blvd, Timisoara, Romania, e-mail: ioan.jurca@cs.upt.ro


Keywords: distributed systems, performance, UML, automation, design improvement, air traffic control.

Abstract
This paper shows how performance analysis results can be used to decide among design alternatives during the development of software systems. This is particularly important in case of distributed systems, which might be unusable if certain performance flaws are detected when they are deployed; usually, at the time of deployment, it is too late or too costly to consider re-designing the system. That’s why the appropriate moment to evaluate performance is at design time, when mistakes can still be fixed and lead to reasonable costs. Performance prediction techniques are applied on system models, since the real system does not exist yet. Among analytical and simulation models, simulation ones are preferred because they can be applied even for complex systems. Performance analysis tools are used to speed-up the process and also to exonerate the developers from the need to master performance analysis techniques.

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