The advances in reliable ultrahigh vacuum systems and techniques over the past ten years have made it possible to maintain a solid surface in an environment in which minimum monolayer formation times are of the order of many hours or even days. As a result, increased emphasis is now being placed on the preparation of clean surfaces or surfaces of known composition. Such preparation is necessary prior to the meaningful study of the various properties of the surface, either crystallographic or electronic. The practical applications of such studies may be found, for example, in photoemitters, secondary emitting surfaces, and thermionic emitters. By means of Auger electron analysis it is becoming increasingly possible to determine the composition of surface contaminants. With such knowledge, appropriate cleaning procedures may be employed and their effectiveness monitored. After briefly describing the Auger effect and a practical spectrometer based on electron bombardment induced Auger emission, some experiments on surface treatment and analysis are described. Observations are made on 304 stainless steel, gallium arsenide, and tungsten.