Computer Measurement Group - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Computer Measurement Group (CMG), founded in 1974, is a worldwide non-profit organization

Non-profit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

of data processing

Data processing

Computer data processing is any process that a computer program does to enter data and summarise, analyse or otherwise convert data into usable information. The process may be automated and run on a computer. It involves recording, analysing, sorting, summarising, calculating, disseminating and...

professionals whose work involves measuring and managing the performance of computing systems. In this context, performance is understood to mean the response time of software applications

Application software

Application software, also known as an application or an "app", is computer software designed to help the user to perform specific tasks. Examples include enterprise software, accounting software, office suites, graphics software and media players. Many application programs deal principally with...

of interest, and the overall capacity (or throughput) characteristics of the system, or of some part of the system.

CMG members are primarily concerned with evaluating and maximizing the performance of existing computer systems and networks, and with capacity management

Capacity management

Capacity Management is a process used to manage information technology . Its primary goal is to ensure that IT capacity meets current and future business requirements in a cost-effective manner. One common interpretation of Capacity Management is described in the ITIL framework...

, in which planned enhancements to existing systems or the designs of new systems are evaluated to find the necessary resources

Resource (computer science)

A resource, or system resource, is any physical or virtual component of limited availability within a computer system. Every device connected to a computer system is a resource. Every internal system component is a resource...

required to provide adequate performance at a reasonable cost.

Mission and activities

CMG's purpose is to promote the exchange of technical information among Information Technology (IT)

Information technology

Information technology is the acquisition, processing, storage and dissemination of vocal, pictorial, textual and numerical information by a microelectronics-based combination of computing and telecommunications...

professionals through regional groups, technical publications, and an annual conference. In common with other user groups devoted to a broad range of products or technologies (for example SHARE

SHARE (computing)

SHARE Inc. is a volunteer-run user group for IBM mainframe computers that was founded in 1955 by Los Angeles-area IBM 701 users. It evolved into a forum for exchanging technical information about programming languages, operating systems, database systems, and user experiences for enterprise users...

or DECUS

DECUS

The Digital Equipment Computer Users' Society was an independent computer user group related to Digital Equipment Corporation.The Connect User Group Community, formed from the consolidation in May, 2008 of DECUS, Encompass, HP-Interex, and ITUG is Hewlett-Packard’s largest user community...

), CMG provides education, networking, and leadership opportunities for its members.

The association's activities provide:

Extensive introductory education for new professionals
Information on emerging technology as well as methodology for existing performance professionals
Forums for the exchange of information, promotion of new ideas, and discussions of management information requirements
Focus on practical applications and results oriented methodologies
Encouragement for educational institutions to focus on the IT curriculum.

CMG groups

With over thirty regional and international groups, CMG's wide reaching structure emphasizes an extensive information and peer network. Regional groups hold local educational meetings, typically three or four times a year, and many publish informational newsletters. Regional meetings may span a half-day, a full day (the most common), or occasionally two days. International CMG groups also hold their own annual conferences and publish their own conference proceedings

Proceedings

In academia, proceedings are the collection of academic papers that are published in the context of an academic conference. They are usually distributed as printed books either before the conference opens or after the conference has closed. Proceedings contain the contributions made by researchers...

.

In the US, Regional CMG groups cover the following areas: Boston, Connecticut, Florida, Greater Atlanta, Kansas City, Midwest, Minneapolis, National Capital Area, New York, Northern California, Northwest, Ohio Valley, Philadelphia, Rocky Mountain, St Louis, Salt Lake City, Southern, Southern California, and South West.

International CMG groups exist in Australia, Austria and Eastern Europe (CMG AE), Canada, Central Europe (CECMG), Italy, South Africa, and the United Kingdom (UKCMG)

Focus areas

CMG allows members to exchange information about the measurement, management and performance of Information technology

Information technology

systems. Topics of particular concern among CMG members include:

Application Performance Management
Application Performance Management
Application performance management, or APM, refers to the discipline within systems management that focuses on monitoring and managing the performance and service availability of software applications....
Computer system benchmarking
Benchmark (computing)
In computing, a benchmark is the act of running a computer program, a set of programs, or other operations, in order to assess the relative performance of an object, normally by running a number of standard tests and trials against it...
Capacity management
Capacity management
Capacity Management is a process used to manage information technology . Its primary goal is to ensure that IT capacity meets current and future business requirements in a cost-effective manner. One common interpretation of Capacity Management is described in the ITIL framework...
Capacity planning
Capacity planning
Capacity planning is the process of determining the production capacity needed by an organization to meet changing demands for its products. In the context of capacity planning, "capacity" is the maximum amount of work that an organization is capable of completing in a given period of time...
Computer networking
Network-attached storage
Network-attached storage
Network-attached storage is file-level computer data storage connected to a computer network providing data access to heterogeneous clients. NAS not only operates as a file server, but is specialized for this task either by its hardware, software, or configuration of those elements...
Network performance management
Network performance management
- Factors affecting network performance :Not all networks are the same. As data is broken into component parts for transmission, several factors can affect their delivery....
Performance analysis
Performance analysis
In software engineering, profiling is a form of dynamic program analysis that measures, for example, the usage of memory, the usage of particular instructions, or frequency and duration of function calls...
Performance testing
Performance testing
In software engineering, performance testing is in general testing performed to determine how a system performs in terms of responsiveness and stability under a particular workload...
Performance tuning
Performance tuning
Performance tuning is the improvement of system performance. This is typically a computer application, but the same methods can be applied to economic markets, bureaucracies or other complex systems. The motivation for such activity is called a performance problem, which can be real or anticipated....

Performance engineering

Performance Engineering

Performance engineering within systems engineering, encompasses the set of roles, skills, activities, practices, tools, and deliverables applied at every phase of the Systems Development Life Cycle which ensures that a solution will be designed, implemented, and operationally supported to meet the...

Storage area network

A storage area network is a dedicated network that provides access to consolidated, block level data storage. SANs are primarily used to make storage devices, such as disk arrays, tape libraries, and optical jukeboxes, accessible to servers so that the devices appear like locally attached devices...

Systems engineering

Systems engineering is an interdisciplinary field of engineering that focuses on how complex engineering projects should be designed and managed over the life cycle of the project. Issues such as logistics, the coordination of different teams, and automatic control of machinery become more...

Systems management

Systems management refers to enterprise-wide administration of distributed systems including computer systems. Systems management is strongly influenced by network management initiatives in telecommunications....

Virtualization

Hardware virtualization

Computer hardware virtualization is the virtualization of computers or operating systems. It hides the physical characteristics of a computing platform from users, instead showing another abstract computing platform...

Web operations

Web operations is a domain of expertise within IT systems management that involves the deployment, operation, maintenance, tuning, and repair of web-based applications....

Website monitoring

Website monitoring is the process of testing and verifying that end-users can interact with a website or web application. Website monitoring is often used by businesses to ensure that their sites are live and responding....

Open standard

An open standard is a standard that is publicly available and has various rights to use associated with it, and may also have various properties of how it was designed . There is no single definition and interpretations vary with usage....

Apdex
Apdex
Apdex is an open standard developed by an alliance of companies. It defines a standard method for reporting and comparing the performance of software applications in computing...

-- Application Performance Index standard
ARM
Application Response Measurement
Application Response Measurement is an open standard published by the Open Group for monitoring and diagnosing performance bottlenecks within complex enterprise applications that use loosely-coupled designs or service-oriented architectures....

-- Application Response Measurement standard

Awards

At its annual conference, CMG presents several awards recognizing outstanding contributions to the field of computer measurement and performance evaluation:

The A. A. Michelson Award, first awarded in 1974, is named in honor of Albert Abraham Michelson
Albert Abraham Michelson
Albert Abraham Michelson was an American physicist known for his work on the measurement of the speed of light and especially for the Michelson-Morley experiment. In 1907 he received the Nobel Prize in Physics...

, known for his technical accomplishments in measuring the speed of light and for his role as teacher and inspirer of others. This award is given to one honoree annually, to recognize the same combination of technical excellence and professional contributions.

The J. William Mullen Award, first awarded in 1990, is given in memory of past CMG president Bill Mullen. The award recipient is an individual who exhibits both technical excellence and an engaging presentation style.

The CMG Graduate Fellowship program, begun in 1987, is open to full time graduate students in Computer Science
Computer science
Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...

and related fields. It is intended to encourage and support research in the areas of measurement, modeling, management and analysis of system and network performance.

Best Paper Awards are given to conference papers judged exemplary by industry peers.

Publications

CMG produces a number of both print and electronic publications. Currently there are four unique publications, the CMG Journal, the CMG Proceedings, the CMG Bulletin and MeasureIT. Membership in CMG is required to obtain copies of the publications with the exception of MeasureIT. In addition, some libraries and Universities have copies of the CMG Journal available for reference use.

The free electronic newsletter, MeasureIT, is written by computer and performance professionals and is distributed around the first Tuesday of every month. Anyone may subscribe to MeasureIT by visiting the CMG MeasureIT homepage.

Annual conference

CMG holds an annual conference for performance professionals from around the world. CMG'11 will be held in Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....