An approach of analyzing software performance without requiring hardware is presented. A timing description generator logs instruction performance characteristics for each of the assembly code's instructions. The performance characteristics identify whether an instruction issued or stalled during particular instruction cycles. Once the timing description generator cycles through the instructions and logs performance characteristics for each instruction, the timing description generator generates a performance graph. For each page line, the performance graph includes 1) dual-issue information if applicable, 2) instruction cycle counter values/stalled instruction identifier's that are positioned at corresponding line location values, and 3) the instruction. A developer may analyze the performance graph and identify code locations that require optimization in order to increase performance.