Capacity planning
Capacity planning is the process of estimating and preparing the resources or capabilities needed to meet anticipated demand while accounting for constraints and variation.
100 SQL Server Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
Capacity planning is the process of estimating and validating the computing resources required to meet a system's workload demands.
- How it is used
- Guides DBA-led resource forecasting before deployment, hardware refreshes, edition selection, and cluster failover planning.
- How deep it goes
- Defines future resource estimation and details growth, infrastructure, log, TempDB, headroom, monitoring, and DR-test considerations without prescribing a calculation method.
- Examples
- Uses MagicChoc and Historical Marketing Analysis to project daily ingestion from 200 GB files to 1.78 TB after one year.
- What you can do after
- Operate/configure infrastructure purchasing and database sizing decisions from projected workload growth and failover demand.
Read how 100 SQL Server Mistakes and How to Avoid Them explains capacity planning →
PostgreSQL Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
Capacity planning estimates future data and workload resource requirements to guide system sizing and structural decisions.
- How it is used
- Guides partitioning, scaling, and infrastructure decisions from projected data growth and workload trends.
- How deep it goes
- Works through ingestion and retention estimates, monthly range partitions, query-plan evidence, and long-term statistics; defers detailed infrastructure sizing.
- Examples
- Uses sensor measurements, retail-location growth, a 150-million-row payments table, monthly partitions, and pg_statviz snapshots.
- What you can do after
- Evaluate/understand projected growth to choose a partitioning approach and revise scaling plans using retained statistics.
Read how PostgreSQL Mistakes and How to Avoid Them explains capacity planning →
Think Like a Software Engineering Manager
Capacity planning is the process of estimating the amount of work a team can complete during a period after accounting for constraints and non-delivery activities.
- How it is used
- Aligns planned commitments with the engineering capacity available during a quarter or sprint period.
- How deep it goes
- Includes feature sizing, capacity factors, overcommitment detection, and negotiation over deferred work.
- Examples
- Uses S/M/L feature sizing, a capacity-planning sheet, and a twelve-feature proposal exceeding capacity by 106 days.
- What you can do after
- Evaluate commitments, identify overcommitment, and negotiate realistic feature deferrals with cross-functional partners.
Read how Think Like a Software Engineering Manager explains capacity planning →
Related concepts
- load testinguses · Load testing evaluates a system’s behavior, performance, and capacity under specified levels or patterns of workload.
- simulationuses · A simulation is a modeled or controlled enactment of a system, process, or scenario used to examine or reproduce behavior under specified conditions.
- operational excellencepart of · Operational excellence is the disciplined ability to deliver and operate systems efficiently, predictably, reliably, and with continuous improvement.
- headroomuses · Headroom is the remaining margin between current usage and an applicable capacity, power, or budget limit.
These guides are generated from the text of Manning books by Manning's knowledge graph and link to the sections they draw on. The full books are available on liveBook and at manning.com.