Abstract

Abstract. With the increasing adoption of virtualization and the tran-sition towards Cloud Computing platforms, modern business information systems are becoming increasingly complex and dynamic. This raises the challenge of guaranteeing system performance and scalability while at the same time ensuring efficient resource usage. In this paper, we present a historical perspective on the evolution of model-based performance en-gineering techniques for business information systems focusing on the major developments over the past several decades that have shaped the field. We survey the state-of-the-art on performance modeling and man-agement approaches discussing the ongoing efforts in the community to increasingly bridge the gap between high-level business services and low level performance models. Finally, we wrap up with an outlook on the emergence of self-aware systems engineering as a new research area at the intersection of several computer science disciplines. Key words: business information systems, performance, scalability, predictive modeling, simulation 1