We present a review of the state of the art of segmentation and partitioning techniques of boundary meshes. Recently, these have become a part of many mesh and object manipulation algorithms in computer graphics, geometric modeling and computer aided design. We formulate the segmentation problem as an optimization problem and identify two primarily distinct types of mesh segmentation, namely part segmentation and surface-patch segmentation. We classify previous segmentation solutions according to the different segmentation goals, the optimization criteria and features used, and the various algorithmic techniques employed. We also present some generic algorithms for the major segmentation techniques.