How-to monitor 99.99% uptime for a Unix box?

Actually, this was a question related to Solaris boxes instead of Unix brought up in the Yahoo LoadRunner Group. We have to differ the purpose of the monitoring to two aspects.  (a) Are you monitoring during a load test or (b) are you monitoring in a production environment?

In respond to the questions, I’ve came out with three suggestions: Read the rest of this entry »

How-to configure Unix System Resource monitoring

To monitor Unix System Resources, you will require rstatd. The rstatd daemon is a server that returns performance statistics obtained from the kernel. The rstatd daemon is normally started by the inetd daemon.

In most cases, rstatd is already configured and started from inet. Therefore, you should verify if the rstatd daemon is already running using rup command. The command should report various machine statistics, including rstatd configuration. Run the following command to view the machine statistics: Read the rest of this entry »

2 ways to prepare upload files for a load test!

There will be times that you maybe required to test a upload or download of files activity in a load test. Today, we will discuss about the various methods that you can employ to prepare the files for upload. The methods are as followed:

1. Prepare all the files prior the load test using a bat command.
2. Modify the script to create the files on-the-fly.

Let’s move on to the first method! Read the rest of this entry »

Combining non-standard protocols in a single script that are not listed in Multi-Protocol selection

Have you ever wanted a combination of two separate protocols that were unavailable in the list of multi-protocol? For example, part of the web application has streaming video component and the activities to be recorded requires you to login, conduct some verification before you have the video link for the user to click. If you need to test the entire flow, you may want to have Media Player (MMS) with Web (HTTP/HTML) combined together to emulate the activities. Read the rest of this entry »

How-to retrieve parameter data from MySQL database

As you’ve know, LoadRunner offers the feature of retrieving parameter data from database with the Database Query Wizard in Vugen. This allows ease and alternative preparation of your parameter data for load test. By putting a little creativity on this feature, we need not limit ourselves to the example of Microsoft Access database as mentioned in it’s Vugen User Guide, we can extend this feature to other types of database, say, MySQL database!

Let’s go through a technical overview of what you need to do for it to work!

1. Get and install the database driver to connect to the database
2. Get the database connection string
3. Get the SQL statement for query
4. Create a new parameter using Database Query Wizard
5. Enter the connection string and the SQL statement

Now, let’s go through the details here with some screenshots to make it easier to understand. Read the rest of this entry »