Load Testing Blog
Checking HTTP status codes from your Selenium/Java tests with the Meddler extension
Over the years, I’ve see a couple of questions repeatedly on the Selenium boards related to HTTP status codes: How do I check for broken links (404s)? How can I check the status code of a web-service request made from my web-app? The answer is usually “Selenium can not do that” because, of course, Selenium is a browser automation tool – not a full-featured testing solution. Other answers suggest various solutions…none that I’ve seen are elegant.
Introducing the Parallel extension for MuseIDE
Executing a load test implies running many tests at the same time…making this ability a crucial part of my work to add load testing capabilities to the Muse Test Framework and MuseIDE. This extension provides just that feature – running multiple tests in a test suite in parallel. After all, a load test is really just a test suite executed with a high level of parallelism and additional (performance) goals.
Introducing the Measurements extension for MuseIDE
The Measurements extension is a free (and open-source) project extension for MuseIDE and the Muse Test Framework that adds evaluation of performance criteria to a test. This initial release adds two new capabilities:
Collect and store the durations of steps in the test, for later analysis.
Compare the duration of steps to performance goals and record a test failure when the goal is exceeded.
The extension is available for installation directly within the MuseIDE: after opening your project, go to Extensions and switch to the Available tab. The Measurement extension can be installed into your project with the click of a button:
Each … Continue reading »
REST/Web Services and API Load Testing
In this post, I’ll discuss why API testing is important, a typical situation that a tester might experience, and how to perform API testing with Web Performance Tester.
Web Performance Tester 6.5 release
If you’ve been following the quick pace of development of our real-browser features, we know you’ll be excited about these new features:
Extract values
Data in the browser can now be extracted into a user state variable for use later in the testcase. Read more…
Organize testcase steps
The steps in real-browser testcases can now be organized into hierarchical groups for better readability and easier maintenance. Read more…
Improved selection from choice boxes
Drop-down choices now support selection by position in the list (i.e. index) and by the option value (a hidden attribute in the HTML). Continue reading »
Selecting a choice by index or value from a drop-down list in the browser
The first release of Web Performance Tester (WPT) with real browser support allow users to select items from a drop-down list (an HTML Select element) based on the text visible to a human user – just like a real user would do. There are times, however, when choosing based on the position in the list (index) or the hidden value of the selection makes a testcase more robust. This is especially true when the text descriptions of the choices may change due to variations in language, software changes, etc.
Starting with version 6.5, real-browser testcases can be configured to select by … Continue reading »
Extracting Values from the Browser
Occasionally, a testcase requires a bit of information from one page in the testcase to be used on another page, later in the testcase. In some cases, this is exactly what a real user would do (e.g. click on a link chosen based on text that appeared earlier). Other times, it is a hidden identifier that is used to choose the right element from a list later. Either way, an Extract a value step can be used to get data from the browser.
In the above example, an attribute value is extracted and stored in a user state variable named … Continue reading »
Organize Steps into Logical Groups in Real Browser testcases
With Web Performance Tester 6.5 (WPT), you can easily organize the steps in your testcases into groups to make them easier to read and maintain. You can create groups within groups with no limit on the depth. This example shows three groups – the 3rd (Type the post) is contained in the 2nd (Create post and submit). The fourth group, not shown here, includes all the steps in the testcase (i.e. the entire testcase is a group).
Increased productivity and editing on-the-fly
Create groups just like any other step – add a step and change the type to Group. Quickly create your … Continue reading »
Accessing downloaded files in real-browser testcases
Dealing with file downloads is considered by many to be problematic when developing testcases with Selenium/WebDriver. Web Performance Tester (WPT) makes this task relatively effortless when working with Chrome – when the virtual user will initiates a download (by clicking something), the file will be downloaded into a directory that exists only for the duration of that testcase. This solves one problem – running out of disk space due to files downloaded during test iterations – because when the testcase ends, the temporary folder is removed along with the downloaded files.
Some tests require validating the content of the file, so … Continue reading »
Web Performance QA Tester and Load Tester 6.4 Released
Real-browser testing can increase your productivity over other testing methods. The features added in the 6.4 release will help you work even more efficiently!
Locator Suggestions
One of the more challenging aspects of working with real-browser testcases is locating the element that you need to interact with. Starting in 6.4, a suggestion button next to every locator field will provide a variety of different locators that you can try if the default locator does not work. These suggestions also help you learn how to create locators – as you will see a wide variety of locator suggestions provided.
Read more about Continue reading »
