Table 9-4 shows a rather dramatic and satisfying flow of performance-improvement metrics. There are a couple items worth highlighting. First, while the physical or logical IO workload dropped, the number of SQL statement executions increased. While not shown in this table, the key SQL statements had a continual elapsed time improvement. The reduction in SQL statement resource consumption occurred in conjunction with a decrease in CPU utilization and total Oracle response time. This is exactly the kind of result we want to see.

While Table 9-4 is a numeric representation of our analysis flow (and success), Figure 9-36 is a graphical representation. Based on logical IOs, Figure 9-36 shows the initial and final response-time curves and the respective arrival rates. Technical and nontechnical people alike should be able to easily grasp that the situation is much better now at point B than when we started at point A. Adding that there is now more room for growth and that the users are also performing more real work (SQL statement execution) will add a final punch to our presentation.

Figure 9-36. Shown is a logical IO-focused response-time curve highlighting and contrasting the initial performance situation (point A) to the final performance situation (point B). This response-time curve indicates a very successful performance effort because fewer resources are required for a single logical IO (service time decreased), users are putting less of a load on the system (not shown: while their work productivity has increased), and the database server's CPU subsystem can now accommodate a much larger future growth.