Jun 28, 2020
Performance Testing - Quality at Speed
Performance Testing Tools
The main purpose of using various performance testing tools is to identify the scope of improvement of the product before it is launched for customer use. It also specifies the measure of scalability, speed, and stability of the application. In case more numbers of user latch to the software, performance testing tools can figure out that it does not slow down when used simultaneously. It is used to check for inconsistency across various operating systems.Quality Assurance analysts and testers use multiple tools and strategies for performance testing based on the requirements of the end-user and product.Performance Testing Metrics
As mentioned above, various metrics are measured during performance testing, essentially to understand the effectiveness and quality of performance testing. It helps in further improvement of the software or mobile apps. There is a fine line of difference between the terms “measurement” and “metrics,” as the former is the data like time taken to respond to a request; and the later is a calculation that uses measurements to define the results’ quality, like total response time/request. The metrics used in performance testing of a software system or a mobile app are, as follows:-Response time
Wait time
Average load time
Peak Response time
Error Rate
Concurrent Users
Requests per second
Transactions passed or failed
Throughput
CPU Utilization
Memory Utilization
How to do Performance Testing?
The main objective of Performance testing is to demonstrate that the mobile app or software system meets the performance criteria, which is already pre-defined. Different testers may follow different strategies for Performance testing. Let us understand the generic process of Performance testing, commonly used by a performance tester. It is often called the Performance testing life cycle.1. Identify Testing Environment
It is done mainly to understand the physical test environment, the production environment, and identifying various performance testing tools that are available. To perform efficient testing, testers need to know hardware, software, and network configuration details before the actual testing procedure.2. Determining the Performance Criteria
The performance testers should be encouraged to define the goals and performance criteria as the performance benchmarks may vary in different cases. It includes performance criteria like response time, throughput, and resource allocation. Usually, testers compare their app to a similar one, to identify the performance criteria for their product.
3. Planning and Designing
The behavior of end-users varies in different scenarios and depends on the type of software or app as well. Performance testing of mobile apps or software is crucial for simulation of various end-users, planning of test data, and outlining all the performance metrics.4. Configuration of Test Environment
It is essential to prepare the testing environment, arrange tools, and other resources, before the execution of the performance test.
5. Implementing Test Design
Performance tests need to be created according to the test designs.
6. Run Tests
At this step, the performance tests are run and monitored to identify any flaws in the software or app.
7. Analysis
Finally, the test results are collected and consolidated for analysis and sharing with other team members. Fine-tuning and re-testing help in further improvement at each step and eventually stops when the CPU causes the bottleneck. Increasing the power of the CPU can help, in this case.
Performance Testing using JMeter
Performance testing is used to analyze the overall performance of the server under heavy load, and it helps in determining that the mobile app, web app, or software will work efficiently for high load requirements. A typical performance testing tool is Apache JMeter, which includes Load Test and Stress Test, to offer various benefits, as mentioned below:Testing performance of Static resources, like HTML and JavaScript
Testing Performance of Dynamic resources, like Servlets, JSP, and Ajax
Identify the maximum load of concurrent users that can be handled with a website
Provides graphical analysis of Performance reports
Performance Testing of Cloud-based Applications
Cloud computing is gaining a lot of popularity these days, mainly because of its cost-effectiveness. As performance is a pivotal factor in testing a web or mobile application, it is essential to measure the performance metrics of the cloud-based applications.
An inherent and essential step in Application Development is performance monitoring, as it verifies that the application is not impacted by any degradation factor that could be otherwise preventable. A simple sanity check can confirm this and is crucial in the case of parallel computing. While building an Agile Enterprise, performance monitoring needs to be integrated with VDM, to provide a model-based context. The performance testing test cases in the cloud differ from other traditional applications. Various Performance tests that should be conducted in cloud-based applications are, as follows:Stress test
Load test
Browser testing
Latency testing
Targeted Infrastructure test
Failover test
Capacity test
Soak test
Raghav Vashishth
Performance Testing, API Testing, Mobile & Web Testing
About the Author
Raghav is a QA enthusiast working as a Team Lead at BugRaptors. He has diverse exposure in various projects and application testing with a comprehensive understanding of all aspects of SDLC. He has 7 plus years of hands-on experience with blue-chip companies like Hitachi, Vmware, and Kloves. He is well versed in Load and Performance testing, API Testing, Manual testing, Mobile application testing, Web application testing and can create effective documentation related to testing such as Test Plan, Test Cases, Test Reports, etc.
