Load Testing Blog
iPad or iPhone iOS Load Testing
With the rapid growth of tablets and smart phone purchases, the popularity of mobile browsers have increased significantly. Our own site has seen an increase in mobile traffic from 0.2% of two years ago, to 2.5% mobile traffic today. Due to the increase in popularity of mobile browsers, it is becoming essential to test the performance of your website on a mobile device as well.
Web Performance Load Tester records all the HTTP traffic between the browser and server through a transparent proxy, this allows for Load Tester to be flexible with the types of browsers that can be emulated during a … Continue reading »
Troubleshooting Obsolete License Error
So your license is obsolete, what exactly does that mean? By default a Load Tester license is not set to expire unless it is a temporary license. An obsolete license essentially means that the license version does not match the Load Tester version number.
When a license is mismatched, the following message appears:
As you can see on the License Key Summary, the version code is listed as 4.2, however the current version of Load Tester I have installed is 4.3.
When a license shows up as obsolete, you have two options:
Match up the license version with a downgraded version … Continue reading »
Tips for Implementing a Content Delivery Network
This post will focus on providing tips for implementing a CDN. Since there are multiple CDN providers, each with their own setup procedures, configuration of a CDN will be contingent on the provider and the service rendered. However, whether it be a CDN for a blog or website, the following pointers will be useful while implementing a CDN.
Ensure that YSlow recognizes the CDN. YSlow is pre-loaded with a list of popular Content Delivery Networks, however all CDNs are not included in the list. If a CDN is not included in the list, a site will most likely get an F … Continue reading »
Content Delivery Networks
When our customers have bandwidth limitations or latency issues, we often encourage them to use a Content Delivery Network. A Content Delivery Network can offer a variety of benefits. What is a Content Delivery Network and what are the pros and cons of using one?
A Content Delivery Network is a cluster of web servers located in different parts … Continue reading »
Deleting Recorded URLs in Load Tester 4.2
Sometimes while recording a testcase, you might capture URLs (like google analytics and certain 3rd party content) that you do not necessarily want to load test. In previous versions of Load Tester, removing any unwanted URLs required selecting the unwanted link and deleting each link individually. Removing the links could be cumbersome and time consuming especially if the unwanted URLs were repeated multiple times on different pages. With the 4.2 release of Load Tester, the Mass Delete function can now be used to delete multiple URLs with the same domain name at the same time.
Note: Recording unwanted URLs can be … Continue reading »
Changing Recorded hostnames & URLs in Load Tester
From time to time we get support questions from customer asking us how to update a recorded testcase to a different URL without having to re-record the testcase. If the content of the new URL/server is very similar to the original URL/server, then a re-recording of the testcase may not be necessary. Simply updating the recorded URLs with the new URLs should be all that is needed to get the original recording working with the new URL/server. Below are the steps on how to update recorded URLs in Load Tester 4.2.
Updating recorded URLs
In order to change the transaction URLs, switch to … Continue reading »
Editing Datasets Made Easier in 4.2
In the upcoming release of Web Performance Load Tester 4.2 it is now easier to edit datasets. In previous releases of Load Tester, deleting rows of data required either selecting each row individually and manually deleting it or exporting the dataset to an excel spreadsheet, removing the data and importing the file back to Load Tester. With Web Performance Load Tester 4.2, you can now simply highlight all the rows you want to remove and click on the “remove dataset row” icon. Adding rows is just as easy, simply click on the “add dataset rows” icon.
Continue reading »
How-To: Recording Local Host Server
Recently we have been getting a lot of questions regarding how to use Load Tester to record against local host. While it is possible to record a local server, and may be useful for testcase development, it is however not recommended to run a load test on the same machines as the local server. Running a load test on the server can produce confusing and misleading results as well as cause resource issues. In order to get useful results, Load Tester and the web server need to be on separate machines.
In order to record against the local host; use the … Continue reading »
Load Testing Back to Basics: Missing User Variables Errors
There are a few errors that are frequently reported by customers. One of them being the missing user variables error. A missing user variables error basically means that a variable that was suppose to be extracted on an earlier page was not extracted, and the user is now trying to use that variable. The error can be caused by a number of things, the most common are server connectivity issues and improper configuration of a dynamic value.
If the missing user variable error was caused by server connectivity issues, there tends to be a server error before … Continue reading »
Introduction to Load Testing: Part One
The website is completed or mostly completed and you have been advised to do a load test, but you are not quite sure were to begin. First things first, a basic understanding of load testing procedure is needed. The load testing procedure mostly involves understanding the web-application that will be tested. Understanding the applications refers to many different factors such as:
Understanding the functionality of the website.
Understanding the general network layout.
Understanding the software and hardware used by the system.
These factors are useful for a number of reasons, not only do they make the load testing process easier, but they can help … Continue reading »