Load Runner 8.0 (Day 1)

LoadRunner 8.0 Mercury

D a y - 1

Agenda – Day 1 ( LoadRunner Overview )

Introducing LoadRunner

What’s New in LoadRunner 8.0?

LoadRunner Terminology

LoadRunner Components

Load Test Workflow

How LoadRunner Works?

LoadRunner Solution

Types of Performance Testing

Objectives of Performance Testing

When is Load Testing Needed?

Why Load Test your Application?

Questions A Performance Test Should Answer.

Supporting Environments

Introduction to Load Runner 8.0

Load Runner is a Mercury Interactive Tool that predicts performance and behavior of the system

By creating lots of load, you can see how the system reacts at peak levels or with simultaneous Users

To test the application, LoadRunner emulates an environment where multiple users work concurrently. While the application is under load, LoadRunner accurately measures and analyzes the system performance, and its functionality.

What's New in LoadRunner 8.0 ?

What’s new In Load Testing?

The first unified application for Performance Testing, Tuning and Diagnostics.

Accurate prediction of system performance, pinpoint application bottlenecks and resolve infrastructure bottlenecks

Provides a web-based, enterprise-wide load testing solutions

Contd… Load Testing

What's New in LoadRunner 8.0 ?

What’s new In Diagnosing?

Introduces J2EE Diagnostics, Siebel Diagnostics, and Oracle Diagnostics

Gives the complete visibility into J2EE, Siebel and Oracle component Performance under Load

First time you can drill down from a slow end user transaction all the way to the slow method

Diagnosing Contd…

What’s New in LoadRunner 8.0 ?

What’s new In Tuning?

A complete solution to help you identify, isolate, and resolve performance problems in your infrastructure

Tuning console is a part of Mercury Interactive’s performance center product line, which is a comprehensive solution for performance testing, tuning, and diagnostics.

Tuning

Scenarios

Using LoadRunner, you divide your application performance testing requirements into scenarios.

A scenario defines the events that occur during each testing sessions.

For example, a scenario defines and controls the number of users to emulate, the actions that they perform, and the machines on which they run their emulations.

Vusers

In a scenario, LoadRunner replaces human users with virtual users or Vusers.

When you run a scenario, Vusers emulate the actions of human users—submitting input to the server.

A scenario can contain tens, hundreds, or even thousands of Vusers.

Contd….

Vuser Scripts

The actions that a Vuser performs during the scenario are described in a Vuser script.

When you run a scenario, each Vuser executes a Vuser script. Vuser scripts include functions that measure and record the performance of the server during the scenario.

Transactions

To measure the performance of the server, you define transactions.

Transactions measure the time that it takes for the server to respond to tasks submitted by Vusers.

Contd….

Rendezvous Points

You insert rendezvous points into Vuser scripts to emulate heavy user load on the server.

Rendezvous points instruct multiple Vusers to perform tasks at exactly the same time.

For example, to emulate peak load on the bank server, you insert a rendezvous point to instruct 100 Vusers to simultaneously deposit cash into their accounts.

Controller

You use the LoadRunner Controller to manage and maintain your scenarios.

Using the Controller, you control all the Vusers in a scenario from a single workstation.

Contd….

Hosts

When you execute a scenario, the LoadRunner Controller distributes each Vuser in the scenario to a host.

The host is the machine that executes the Vuser script, enabling the Vuser to emulate the actions of a human user.

Performance Analysis

Vuser scripts include functions that measure and record system performance during load-testing sessions.

During a scenario run, you can monitor the network and server resources.

Following a scenario run, you can view performance analysis data in reports and graphs.

LoadRunner Components Contd…. Controller VuGen Analysis LoadRunner Tuning

VuGen (Virtual User Generator) – records Vuser Scripts that emulate the steps of real Users using the application

The Controller is an administrative center for creating, maintaining, and executing scenarios. The controller assigns Vusers and load generators to scenarios.

Starts and stops load tests, and perform other Administrative tasks

Components of LoadRunner 8.0 Contd….

Components of LoadRunner 8.0

LR Analysis uses the load test results to create graphs and reports that are used to correlate system information and identify both bottlenecks and performance issues.

Tuning helps you quickly isolate and resolve performance bottlenecks. By adding a centralized tuning console to LoadRunner, the Mercury Tuning Module ensures that performance bottlenecks are resolved during testing, and helps you determine the optimized configuration settings for production.

Load Test Work Flow

How LoadRunner Works?

The LoadRunner Solution Contd….

The LoadRunner Solution

The LoadRunner automated solution addresses the drawbacks of manual performance testing:

LoadRunner reduces the personnel requirements by replacing human users with virtual users or Vusers. These Vusers emulate the behavior of real users — operating real applications.

Because numerous Vusers can run on a single computer, LoadRunner reduces the hardware requirements.

The LoadRunner Controller allows you to easily and effectively control all the Vusers — from a single point of control.

LoadRunner monitors the application performance online, enabling you to fine-tune your system during test execution.

Contd….

The LoadRunner Solution

LoadRunner automatically records the performance of the application during a test. You can choose from a wide variety of graphs and reports to view the performance data.

LoadRunner checks where performance delays occur: network or client delays, CPU performance, I/O delays, database locking, or other issues at the database server. LoadRunner monitors the network and server resources to help you improve performance.

Because LoadRunner tests are fully automated, you can easily repeat them as often as you need.

Types of Performance Testing Find out whether the system can handle the expected load upon deployment under real-world conditions. Find the application's breaking point. Apply testing that measures whether the application's environment is properly configured to handle expected or potentially unexpected high transaction volumes. Find the stability of the system with respect to handling large amounts of data over extended time periods. Find the behavior and performance of each tier . Load Testing Stress Testing Volume Testing Component Testing

Objectives of Performance Testing

How long does it take to complete a task?

Application Response Time Reliability Configuration Sizing Capacity Planning Acceptance Bottleneck Identification Regression Product Evaluation How Stable is the system under a heavy work load? Which configuration provides the best performance level? At what point does degradation in performance occur? Is the system stable enough to go into Production? What is the cause of degradation in performance? Does the new version of Software adversely affect response time? What is the best server for 100 users?

When is Load Testing Needed? Production What is the cause of performance degradation? Deployment Is the system reliable enough to go into production? Development Does the system response time meet requirements? Planning and Design What is the best server to support 1000 users? Evolution How many users can be added without decreasing system performance? Change Management

Why Load Test?

The failure of a mission-critical application can be costly.

Assure performance and functionality under real-world conditions.

Locate potential problems before your customers do.

Reduce development Time.

Reduce infrastructure costs

Questions a performance test should Answer

Does the Application respond quickly enough for the intended users?

Will the application handle the expected user load and beyond?

Will the application handle the number of transactions required by the business?

Is the application stable under expected and unexpected user loads?

Are you sure that users will have a positive experience on go-live day?

Application Deployment Solution - The Citrix protocol.

Client/Server - MS SQL, ODBC, Oracle Web Applications 11i, DB2 CLI, Sybase Ctlib, Sybase Dblib, Windows Sockets, and DNS protocols.

Custom - C templates, Visual Basic templates, Java templates, Javascript, and VBScript type scripts.

Distributed Components - COM/DCOM, Corba-Java, and Rmi-Java protocols.

E-Business - FTP, LDAP, Palm, Web (HTTP/HTML), Web Services, and the dual Web/Winsocket protocols.

Enerprise Java Beans -EJB Testing and RMI-Java protocols.

ERP/CRM - Baan, Oracle NCA, Peoplesoft 8, Peoplesoft-Tuxedo, SAP-Web, SAPGUI, SAPGUI/SAP-Web dual, and Siebel (Siebel-DB2 CLI, Siebel-MSSQL, Siebel-Web, and Siebel-Oracle) protocols.

Contd….