Developers are usually unaware of the impact of code changes to the performance of software systems. Although developers can analyze the performance of a system by executing, for instance, a performance test to compare the performance of two consecutive versions of the system, changing from a programming task to a testing task would disrupt the development flow. In this paper, we propose the use of a city visualization that dynamically provides developers with a pervasive view of the continuous performance of a system. We use an immersive augmented reality device (Microsoft HoloLens) to display our visualization and extend the integrated development environment on a computer screen to use the physical space. We report on technical details of the design and implementation of our visualization tool, and discuss early feedback that we collected of its usability. Our investigation explores a new visual metaphor to support the exploration and analysis of possibly very large and multidimensional performance data. Our initial result indicates that the city metaphor can be adequate to analyze dynamic performance data on a large and non-trivial software system.

1. Leonel Merino
University of Stuttgart
Alexandre Bergel
University of Chile
Oscar Nierstrasz
University of Bern
ICPE-Vision - 09.04.2019leonel_merino
PerfVis: Pervasive Visualization
in Immersive Augmented Reality
for Performance Awareness
Mario Hess
University of Bern
Daniel Weiskopf
University of Stuttgart

2. Leonel Merino
University of Stuttgart
Alexandre Bergel
University of Chile
Oscar Nierstrasz
University of Bern
ICPE-Vision - 09.04.2019leonel_merino
PerfVis: Pervasive Visualization
in Immersive Augmented Reality
for Performance Awareness
Mario Hess
University of Bern
Daniel Weiskopf
University of Stuttgart

3. 3
Overview History
Software Performance

4. History
4
City Visualization

5. History
5
NOA
NOM
NLOC

6. History
6

7. History
7

8. History
8

9. 9
Demo

11. 11
Software Stack
network
Moose
Spy2
Roassal
CodeCity
MixedRealityToolkit

12. 12
Software Stack
network
Moose
Spy2
Roassal
CodeCity
MixedRealityToolkit

13. 13
Software Stack
network
Moose
Spy2
Roassal
CodeCity
MixedRealityToolkit

14. 14
Early Feedback on Usability
• Techniques
-The narrow field of views the HoloLens impose a challenge to
pervasive visualizations.
+Visualizations scale well to the available physical space on a
desk.
• Interactions
-Difficulties to select small elements through head movements.
-Low contrast can lead to visualizations hard to see.
+Interest for more advanced interactions to pause and rewind the
animation of the visualizations.

15. 15
Early Feedback on Usability
• Techniques
-The narrow field of views the HoloLens impose a challenge to
pervasive visualizations.
+Visualizations scale well to the available physical space on a
desk.
• Interactions
-Difficulties to select small elements through head movements.
-Low contrast can lead to visualizations hard to see.
+Interest for more advanced interactions to pause and rewind the
animation of the visualizations.

16. Summary
PerfVis: Pervasive Visualization in Immersive Augmented Reality for Performance Awareness
Leonel Merino
University of Stuttgart
Alexandre Bergel
University of Chile
Oscar Nierstrasz
University of Bern
Mario Hess
University of Bern
Daniel Weiskopf
University of Stuttgart
ICPE-Vision - 09.04.2019leonel_merino