Load and Performance Load Testing

RadView Software
October 2015
www.radview.com
Contents

Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 3
Key Components and Architecture .................................................................................................. 4
Creating Load Tests .......................................................................................................................... 5
Mobile Load Testing ......................................................................................................................... 9
Test Execution ................................................................................................................................ 10
Analytics ......................................................................................................................................... 14
Web Analysis Dashboard ............................................................................................................... 15
Integrating WebLOAD with other Tools......................................................................................... 16
Selenium Performance Testing ...................................................................................................... 16
DevOps and Continuous Integration.............................................................................................. 17
Supported Technologies ................................................................................................................ 17

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Introduction
WebLOAD is an enterprise-scale performance and load testing tool, offered since 1993 by RadView
Software. Leading organizations depend on WebLOAD to load test web and mobile applications,
including GoDaddy, eBay, Ebix, ConnocoPhilips, Ellucian, DeVry University, as well as other leading
financial institutions, retail and manufacturing companies and universities.
WebLOAD is both easy to use and powerful enough to handle the most complex testing challenges. It
simulates heavy load in a broad range of web, mobile, and cloud environments, is designed as an open
framework platform to integrate with any tool and technology, and provides actionable intelligence to
rapidly identify and resolve bottlenecks.
Many of our customers have switched from LoadRunner in order to take advantage of the enhanced
productivity, better support and reduced costs.
We are committed to your success and would appreciate helping you take your performance testing to
the next level.

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Key Components and Architecture

WebLOAD includes four key components.

 The Integrated Development Environment (IDE) enables generating load test scenarios via
recording and scripting, using the native JavaScript scripting language. The WebLOAD IDE
includes a rich set of tools for handling correlation, parameterization, response validation,
messaging, scripting and debugging.
 The WebLOAD Console creates test definitions and executes tests while charting results in real
time, querying server performance data, and saving measurements for analysis and reporting.
 WebLOAD Analytics charts results in a coherent report that communicates what happened
during a test. The charts support many forms of analysis including root cause. Analytics ships
with 80 preconfigured report templates. Users can create their own temporary or permanent
templates and can be published in a variety of formats.
 The Web Dashboard is an embedded web server that allows multiple stakeholders to share and
examine test results. It is particularly useful for Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous
Delivery (CD) workflows involving multiple teams. The Dashboard can display test results while a
test is running or at a later time as needed.

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Creating Load Tests
Using the WebLOAD IDE, you can build load test scenarios easily and efficiently. In addition, you can
take advantage of:
 Recording
 Correlation
 Drag-and-drop building blocks
 Parameterization
 Script debugger
Then, extend and enhance your script with any logic and integrations, using WebLOAD’s native
JavaScript scripting language.

Recording
Record your actions on your target application and WebLOAD automatically translates your actions into
a test script. Recording is transparent and automatic with any web technology, including HTTP/HTTPS
(SSL,TLS), WebSocket, AJAX, SOAP, HTML5, WebDAV and others.
WebLOAD generates a test script in JavaScript, which provides the flexibility to add any logic, call Java
classes and add integrations – with a scripting environment that’s familiar to any web developer.

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Dynamic Values Correlation
WebLOAD automatically identifies and replaces dynamic values that are unique for each run of the
script, such as session IDs, time, and others. While other load testing tools may require manually editing
1000 lines of code with correlation parameters, WebLOAD generates a dozen blocks of codes that can
be fine-tuned within minutes.

Drag-and-Drop Building Blocks

Accelerate load scenario development by dragging and dropping elements into
your script. Select from load test commands (sleep, transaction, timers,
exceptions, synchronizations, etc.), Web protocol actions (ftp, smtp, pop, db,
etc), actions for database, mobile, multimedia, WebSockets, as well as validation
points.

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Parameterization
Parameterize your script to simulate real-life users, replace hard-coded values, and avoid caching effect.
WebLOAD’s parameterization wizard lets you replace dynamic values in your script with parameters for
date, time, random numbers/strings and input files.

Response Validation
Insure that script playback stays in sync with the server state. If a validation fails, a message can be sent,
the round can end, the entire test can be stopped, or WebLOAD can run any JavaScript function.

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Web Services/REST
WebLOAD lets you test RESTful web services, offering built-in support for SOAP, Rest, XML, JSON,
WebDAV. You can effectively record and replay any service, with WebLOAD supporting the full range of
HTTP commands.
WebLOAD supports WebDAV (Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning), the HTTP protocol
extension which enables the collaborative editing and management of files on remote web servers. It
seamlessly records and replays WebDAV requests and commands such as Copy, Move, Lock, etc. In
many Web Services it is common to transfer parameters to the service via form data. WebLOAD
presents such parameters within the script as part of the form data, making it easy to manipulate values.
XML and JSON objects can be presented in a string or in a JavaScript object, making it easy to
manipulate the values according to your needs. Using the JSON and XML parser you can easily convert
between the raw Web Services request and a JavaScript object. Finally, WebLOAD identifies dynamic
values in XML and JSON values and performs automatic correlation, which you can easily edit.

Script Debugging
Validate your test script to confirm it runs accurately after you complete your script editing. Identify all
issues and errors early on, using breakpoints, Watch and Step elements, and don’t waste valuable time
during your full load test runs.

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Mobile Load Testing
WebLOAD provides several ways to load test your system with mobile device usage. You can create
mobile test scripts by:
 Recording native mobile apps or browser-based apps directly from the mobile handset
 Recording from a desktop browser, simulating the mobile browser
 Record a desktop script and modify the settings to simulate a mobile browser
No matter how you create the scripts, you can edit them just like any other test in the WebLOAD editor
to add parameters, validation and logic.

During test execution, you can simulate realistic test scenarios by selecting a variety of different
browsers, devices and capabilities. We recommend that you mix browser types and connection speeds
in the same run in order to better simulate mobile environment.

Perfecto Mobile Integration

WebLOAD integrates with Perfecto Mobile, allowing you to measure the actual experience on a real
mobile device while generating virtual user load on your system. You can:
 Test the user experience using different mobile devices and networks
 View combined statistics of both backend load and real mobile device
 Execute Perfecto Mobile test scripts from within WebLOAD

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Test Execution
WebLOAD can simulate your virtual user requirements, from hundreds to millions, in the full range of
internet protocols. Virtual users are designed with a small footprint to optimize hardware usage and can
be distributed across an unlimited number of machines, on premises or on the cloud, with WebLOAD
managing the distribution of scripts and collecting all the data.
WebLOAD supports local or remote load generators on Windows or Linux, as well as load generation on
Amazon web services, or other cloud providers.

The WebLOAD Console

The WebLOAD Console lets you manage scenario execution and virtual user distribution.

Create Realistic Load Scenarios

WebLOAD lets you simulate realistic and varied load
conditions for an unlimited number of users. You
can define a variety of scripts, browsers, and
network characteristics in a single test run. Through
the scheduler, you can control the load build-up in
different ways that mimic real-life conditions,
including linear, steps, and increments. You can
change the load size during execution using the
throttle control feature, stop for analysis and restart
any time.

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Goal-Oriented Testing
To ensure that your application meets agreed
upon SLAs, you can define a performance goal
and let WebLOAD put it to the test. For
example, you can define a goal of response time
less than three seconds, and WebLOAD will
design and run a scenario to test that goal. After
execution, WebLOAD reports how well your
application held up.

Cloud Load testing

WebLOAD lets you run performance testing from
the cloud by generating virtual user load from
Amazon EC2 within minutes. With zero
installation or setup you can:
 Generate load from multiple locations in
the world
 Distribute load between cloud and on
premise machines
 Pay Amazon directly, based on your
usage.
WebLOAD provides a pre-configured public
Amazon Machine Image (AMI), which lets you
quickly generate virtual user load with minimal
setup using your own Amazon account. Your
cloud load testing costs are based solely on actual
performance test usage, WebLOAD automatically
terminates the cloud test machines upon
completion of test sessions.
You can distribute load between on premise machines and geographically distributed Amazon cloud
machines – to create a real-life scenario that matches your needs or simply to lower your costs.

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Collect Client and User Experience Data
During test execution, the load generator collects detailed client-side statistics. It enables you to track
low-level data or complete transactions. Client-side data is averaged in order to provide meaningful
load analytics. In addition, a special virtual user called a Probing Client gives you a full picture of the
individual user experience rather than generalized application performance.

Monitoring server performance under load

WebLOAD collects server-side performance data from operating systems, web servers, application
servers, and database servers to help you identify the root-cause of problems. WebLOAD Performance
Measurements Manager enables the direct correlation of your load scenario with data such as CPU,
memory, capacity, processes, disk I/O, and queue data, you can quickly track down bottlenecks and
pinpoint the weak links in your system.

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Server side data is displayed in real time as part of WebLOAD’s results analytics reports. This simple
example presents memory degradation as the load size is increased.

WebLOAD’s monitoring does not require the server-side installation of an agent. It can be configured to
handle secure servers located behind a firewall, supports:
 The import of server-side statistics from 3rd party monitoring tools
 The export of monitoring data to external systems.

Built-in server monitoring

WebLOAD provides out-of-the-box monitoring for a range of operating systems, web servers,
application servers databases. For the full list, see the Supported Technologies web page.
In addition, WebLOAD supports standard APIs through which servers expose performance data – such as
JMX, SNMP, RSTATD, Windows Performance Monitor, SSH, and JDBC.

Root-cause Analysis using APM tools

WebLOAD’s built-in integration with application performance management (APM) tools, such as
Dynatrace™ and AppDynamics™, helps you take root cause analysis one step further. Once you identify
a performance issue using WebLOAD you can switch to your APM tool and directly relate the WebLOAD
transaction to the server-side event. You can accurately identify events behind bottlenecks and quickly
resolve issues.

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Analytics
Actionable Intelligence
WebLOAD provides you with actionable intelligence to help you identify performance bottlenecks in
your system. Combining performance metrics with data collected by server monitors, it provides you
with 80 out-of-the-box reports and graphs that let you drill down at any angle and granular level
to pinpoint problems.

Customizable Reports
Customizable reports enable you to identify specific areas and to compare metrics across load sessions.
You can choose from a variety of templates and apply filters, change the design, and save your choices.
Following your load test session, WebLOAD Analytics automatically generates a set of reports and
indicates places where threshold violations occurred so you can drill down on problem areas
immediately. Once WebLOAD Analytics has launched, your default charts are automatically opened, and
threshold rules are applied. Charts with threshold violations are marked in the report view. At a glance,
you can see flags such as connection issues and slow page times. Clicking on a chart shows the details.

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Web Analysis Dashboard
The Web Dashboard improves the efficiency of your test analysis and resolution process by providing
access to performance test results from any web browser or mobile device.
Share and communicate results such as Response/transaction time, throughput and errors between
multiple team members and report performance issues to management.
You can:
 Customize your own views of results and graphs
 View real-time result of tests as they are running
 Share a customized report view with colleagues
 View results from tablets and smartphones

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Integrating WebLOAD with other Tools
WebLOAD provides several built-in integrations to help incorporate load testing into your application
lifecycle. This includes:
 Jenkins™ plugin to support test automation and Continuous Integration (CI) workflows.
 Selenium™ integration for incorporating real browser performance testing.
 Perfecto Mobile™ integration for running mobile performance testing.
 APM (Application Performance Monitoring) tools integration (Dynatrace™ and AppDynamics™)
for root cause analysis.

Selenium Performance Testing

WebLOAD’s integration with Selenium, the open source testing tool for web browser applications, lets
you integrate real web browsers that perform real activity, into your performance test scenarios and
accurately identify issues.
Using the integration, you can stress your system using WebLOAD’s virtual users to generate the load,
and simultaneously run Selenium web browsers that measure actual client behavior. WebLOAD collects
all test metrics from both the Selenium WebDriver and the backend servers, to provide you with a
complete test analysis report. You can record a script in Selenium and then, using WebLOAD’s Selenium
plugin, export the script to be used in WebLOAD. Alternatively, you can also code a Selenium script
directly in the WebLOAD IDE.
WebLOAD provides built-in commands to add accurate performance measurements into the functional
operations of the Selenium script. You can measure end-to-end timing of web activities as well as
measure timing-related statistics for all pages navigated or for a specific web page.

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DevOps and Continuous Integration
WebLOAD lets you automate performance testing and smoothly incorporate it into your Continuous
Delivery and Continuous Integration (CI) processes for faster and more efficient software deployment.
Developers, QA groups and DevOps personnel can collaborate and:
 Orchestrate automatic tests against every build in the pipeline, using WebLOAD’s Jenkins™
plugin. Unlike functional testing, performance testing success/failure is not always clear cut.
With WebLOAD, you can define success/failures criteria based on many factors such as failure of
the entire session, errors and warning, validations, performance measurements, etc. This
provides the flexibility to adjust and determine how changes in performance will affect the next
step in your continuous delivery pipeline.
 Share performance data and track root cause via the web dashboard and WebLOAD’s built-in
integration with APM tools such as AppDynamics and Dynatrace.
 Manage test data in a Git shared repository together with software versions.

Supported Technologies
WebLOAD supports a wide range of web technologies, servers, protocols, operating systems, databases
and enterprise software systems. For an up-to-date list please refer to the Supported Technologies web
page.

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