Enterprises Are Judged by the Measure of IT Performance

Published: June 25, 2008

by Dan Burger

Some planning and problem solving can go a long way toward better IT management and performance management. Of course, that's much easier said than done. However, getting it done becomes much easier with the help of organizations like the Computer Measurement Group (CMG), which consists of the information technology professionals responsible for planning, measuring, and managing the performance of the world's largest IT infrastructures.

Effectively managing performance requires a focus on specific activities and a plan that can handle problems if and when they occur. Presenting information and techniques that can be applied to managing IT capacity and quality of service is CMG's specialty. The not-for-profit professional organization offers training--specifically designed for various levels of expertise, including novice--that builds knowledge and core competencies in areas such as networks, systems, and application components that can predict future performance degradation.

At its annual conference later this year, CMG will spotlight the topic of virtualization and how it adds new levels of effectiveness to infrastructure. There will also be an emphasis on green data centers and energy efficiency. The conference agenda will include tutorial sessions on topics such as the development of capacity plans, using measured performance data; statistical analysis techniques for measured and monitored performance information; monitoring and tuning mainframe systems; an introduction to performance analysis, resource management, and capacity planning for Unix (IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Sun Microsystems) and Linux; MicrosoftWindows systems performance measurement and analysis; TCP/IP performance management; and performance measurement and analysis techniques using modeling and forecasting algorithms and techniques.

Subject areas include management beyond IT infrastructure that includes business performance; benchmarking and measurement techniques; network components, systems, and architectures; storage topics that include virtual storage, NAS, SAN, fibre channel, backup and recovery; and emerging technologies such as blade servers, grid computing, SOA, and RFID.

"We have found that a high percentage of attendees at our annual conference are new to the field," said Bill Jouris, CMG '08 Program Chair. Jouris said the strength of CMG is in the community of professionals who share their ideas and experiences. CMG also provides more experienced practitioners with opportunities to learn about areas they haven't dealt with before, Jouris said. "We have a variety of topics and a superb roster of people teaching."

The CMG '08 Conference, the 34th international conference of this organization, takes place December 7 through 12 in Las Vegas, Nevada, at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel. For more information on the conference, see the conference Web page at the CMG '08.

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