Protecting Sensitive Data

One of the primary functions of a load test is to vet target test applications to see how well they can hold up to production conditions. In that endeavor it is sometimes necessary to provide login credentials and other protected information to be used in conjunction with these tests. This can present a challenge in protecting sensitive data when load testing in the cloud. In this post, we will cover how to test with JMeter inRead More →

A Guide to JMeter Preprocessors and Postprocessors

When building your JMeter test, samplers provide the core functionality. They are responsible for sending the actual HTTP requests and handling those responses. However, as your test becomes more complex and sophisticated, it may be desirable to add conditional logic to your requests. Furthermore, you may wish to dynamically process the inputs and outputs to these. JMeter provides this functionality though a host of preprocessors and postprocessors. This brief post will serve as a guide toRead More →

JMeter Timers Primer

Some of the most versatile components in JMeter are timers. Without JMeter timers, elements of a JMeter test plan are executed sequentially without pausing. This can potentially overwhelm your target test application by generating too many requests in a short period of time. In this brief post, we will cover most of the available types of timers that can be used in JMeter test plans. You can find all available timer elements under the “Timers” submenuRead More →

JMeter Dashboard Report Total Row

The JMeter Dashboard Report can be displayed from any RedLine13 test which has output files enabled.  One question we frequently get from customers using JMeter is how the JMeter Dashboard Report Total row is calculated. Found within the Summary table for this report, the Total row is displayed in a non-intuitive way. Without knowledge of what this line represents, the design of the report with regard to the Total row can be confusing. Depending on what informationRead More →

Schedule a load test

Once some users have written their load tests, they want to schedule a load test to run at a particular time or as part of a continuous integration build process. Or even run a recurring test at the same time on a schedule.  The RedLine13 API makes this all possible. A Practical Example In a previous post we showed how to get started using the RedLine13 API. Building upon this, you can use your scripting languageRead More →

Troubleshooting Common Issues with Selenium Tests on RedLine13

Many RedLine13 customers have a need for full-browser testing. This is something we support with Selenium WebDriver. In this brief post we will cover common issues encountered with Selenium WebDriver tests and when scaling load testing on RedLine13. Test Never Completes Occasionally we encounter a Selenium WebDriver test that otherwise appears to run as expected, however never completes. One possible explanation is a simple one, where the driver.quit() statement is omitted. const main = () =>Read More →

Extracting Metadata from Load Generator Instances

RedLine13 load generator instances are backed by AWS EC2 instances. AWS exposes a special locally-addressable endpoint that returns metadata about that instance. Using this, you can ascertain such things as the region in which your instance resides, private and public addresses, and instance tags amongst other useful data points. A specific example of where this would be useful is where you have defined a load test to run in multiple regions, with a number of EC2-backedRead More →

Pitfalls of Selenium Load Testing

Tests created with Selenium WebDriver replicate the user experience from the perspective of the UI.  It can be thought of as a top-down approach whereby it accurately replicates the behavior of an end user. Running through a browser instance such as Chrome or Firefox, the test process itself interacts with the actual user interface elements of a target test application. This is in contrast to many other testing frameworks.  One of the most popular is JMeter,Read More →

Selenium Basics for Load Testing

We have several examples available to help you get started with Selenium WebDriver testing on RedLine13. In this brief post, we’ll go about constructing a Selenium script from scratch. We will also review the basic necessities and also common pitfalls when deploying on RedLine13. Selenium supports several languages for scripting, with JavaScript being a popular choice. The first line in our script should be instantiating the redline WebDriver instance: const redline = require(‘redline13-webdriver’); We will wantRead More →

Cost-effective cloud load testing

RedLine13 is a fully managed platform that integrates with seamlessly with AWS to provide cost-effective cloud load testing as a service. Being fully managed means that the configuration, startup, data collection, and termination is handled automatically with no coding or scripting required. This means you can scale to any level simply by specifying the quantity of servers you wish to run, to nearly limitless capacity with minimal effort. RedLine13 Cloud Architecture RedLine13 is a platform forRead More →