State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering

SEI Report
As systems have performance requirements, sometimes dominant and explicit, and other times subordinate and implicit. Despite the pervasiveness and importance of performance requirements, performance problems persist. To help us understand why, we sponsored a workshop in performance engineering and conducted some structured interviews with software contractors. This report summarizes our observations.
Publisher

Software Engineering Institute

CMU/SEI Report Number
CMU/SEI-95-TR-020

Abstract

As systems have performance requirements, sometimes dominant and explicit, and other times subordinate and implicit. Despite the pervasiveness and importance of performance requirements, performance problems persist. To help us understand why, we sponsored a workshop in performance engineering and conducted some structured interviews with software contractors. This report summarizes our observations.

Cite This SEI Report

Klein, M. (1996, February 1). State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering. (SEI Report CMU/SEI-95-TR-020). Retrieved June 19, 2026, from https://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/state-of-the-practice-report-problems-in-the-practice-of-performance-engineering/.

@techreport{klein_1996,
author={Klein, Mark},
title={State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering},
month={Feb},
year={1996},
number={{CMU/SEI-95-TR-020},
institution={Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University},
url={https://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/state-of-the-practice-report-problems-in-the-practice-of-performance-engineering/},
note={Accessed: 2026-Jun-19}
}

Klein, Mark. "State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering." (CMU/SEI-95-TR-020). Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University. Software Engineering Institute, February 1, 1996. https://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/state-of-the-practice-report-problems-in-the-practice-of-performance-engineering/.

M. Klein, "State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering," Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University. Software Engineering Institute, SEI Report CMU/SEI-95-TR-020, 1-Feb-1996 [Online]. Available: https://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/state-of-the-practice-report-problems-in-the-practice-of-performance-engineering/. [Accessed: 19-Jun-2026].

Klein, Mark. "State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering." (SEI Report CMU/SEI-95-TR-020). Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Software Engineering Institute, 1 Feb. 1996. https://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/state-of-the-practice-report-problems-in-the-practice-of-performance-engineering/. Accessed 19 Jun. 2026.

Klein, Mark. State of the Practice Report: Problems in the Practice of Performance Engineering. CMU/SEI-95-TR-020. Software Engineering Institute. 1996. https://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/state-of-the-practice-report-problems-in-the-practice-of-performance-engineering/