An Expert Guide to Software Performance Optimization From mobile and cloud apps to video games to driverless vehicle control, more and more software is time-constrained: It must deliver reliable results seamlessly, consistently, and virtually instantaneously. If it doesn't, customers are unhappy--and sometimes lives are put at risk. When complex software underperforms or fails, software engineers need to identify and address the root causes. This is difficult and, historically, few tools have been available to help. In Understanding Software Dynamics, performance expert Richard L. Sites tackles the problem head on, offering expert methods and advanced tools for understanding complex, time-constrained software dynamics, improving reliability and troubleshooting challenging performance problems. Sites draws on several decades of experience pioneering software performance optimization, as well as extensive experience teaching graduate-level developers. He introduces principles and techniques for use in any environment, from embedded devices to datacenters, illuminating them with examples based on x86 or ARM processors running Linux and linked by Ethernet. He also guides readers through building and applying a powerful, new, extremely low-overhead open-source software tool, KUtrace, to precisely trace executions on every CPU core. Using insights gleaned from this tool, readers can apply nuanced solutions--not merely brute-force techniques such as turning off caches or cores. Measure and address issues associated with CPUs, memory, disk/SSD, networks, and their interactions Fix programs that are always too slow, and those that sometimes lag for no apparent reason Design useful observability, logging, and time-stamping capabilities into your code Reason more effectively about performance data to see why reality differs from expectations Identify problems such as excess execution, slow instruction execution, waiting for resources, and software locks Understanding Software Dynamics will be valuable to experienced software professionals, including application and OS developers, hardware and system architects, real-time system designers, and game developers, as well as advanced students. Register your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.

'Ways to Wander' is your invitation to experiment with a whole range of different ways to 'go for a walk'. Rather than picking up a map and following a footpath, the book offers 54 intriguingly different suggestions, tactics and recollections, all submitted by artists (most of them involved with the Walking Artists Network). There are plenty of ideas you can just go out and try, but others are more performative or explore the psychological, cultural and philosophical aspects of walking Pop the book in your back pocket, leave it in your rucksack, share it with friends and take them on a walk, use it in creative workshops, read it as if each instruction were poetry, engage with each page as visual art or as a performance activity, let it remind you of places you've been or walks you'd like to do. When the moment takes you, be inspired by the variety of inventive and reflective ideas mapped out here and then simply... wander.

Make your foray into successive approximations successful and as easy as possible.In the 2012 bestseller, Leaving ADDIE for SAM, learning professionals were introduced to the Successive Approximation Model (SAM) and the Savvy Start—the key to a successful project kick-off. Together, these concepts incorporate contemporary Agile processes that simplify design and development, yielding more energetic and effective learning experiences. This companion Field Guide provides the job aids, tools, and templates you need to put the SAM methodology in motion and take your ISD practice to new heights. Complete with a foreword by Michael Allen, this book is an essential resource to create better, faster training products and “move the needle” on current training efforts.In this book, you will:• Apply the principles and concepts behind Leaving ADDIE for SAM.• Update your training products with these contemporary, Agile design processes.• Use the job aids, tools, and templates provided to work on actual projects.