UNDERSTANDING THE IMPORTANCE OF SOFTWARE PERFORMANCE TESTING AND ITS TYPES
WHAT IS PERFORMANCE TESTING? Software Performance testing is testing conducted to define the performance of the system test and verify the quality characteristics of the system like responsiveness, Speed, Scalability, Stability under varied load conditions. The system is examined under blended load conditions and check the time expected by responding by the system under fluctuating workloads.
WHY DO PERFORMANCE TESTING? Before introducing software to the market, the software system should be examined against the Speed, Stability and scalability under different load conditions. Performance testing comprises a variety of tests which allow an analysis of multiple aspects of the system. Performance testing tells about what is required to fix before going live.
PERFORMANCE TEST TYPE SINGLE USER Performance testing life cycle is carried during the script design stage. For example, in the case of web applications, tools like YSlow, HttpAnalyzer etc. are used for examining the performance of the application.
CONTENTION It is carried during the script design stage of the performance testing life cycle. LIGHT LOAD It is carried as a smoke test during the performance testing life cycle
LOAD It is usually conducted at the very first performance run during the performance testing life cycle. STRESS / VOLUME It is conducted if required during the performance testing lifecycle.
RESILIENCE It is conducted if required during the performance testing lifecycle. FAILURE It is conducted if needed during the performance testing lifecycle. It might need multiple cycles of a run for concluding anything.
RECOVERY It is conducted if needed during the performance testing lifecycle. SPIKE It is conducted if needed during the performance testing lifecycle SOAK It is performed as the last run during the Performance Testing Lifecycle.
1) PERFORMANCE TESTING PROCESS Identifying the testing environment. Do individual requirement analysis regarding testing purposes and its goals. Also, define the testing scope along with test Introduction Checklist. Recognize the logical and physical production planning for performance testing, distinguish the software, hardware and networks configurations needed to execute performance testing.
2) RECOGNIZE THE PERFORMANCE ACCEPTANCE CRITERIA Recognize the desired performance characteristics of the application like Response time, Throughput and Resource Utilization.
3) PLAN & DESIGN PERFORMANCE TESTS Planning and creating performance tests include classifying critical usage situations, discovering relevant variability across users, classifying and creating test data, and specifying the metrics to be collected. Ultimately, these items will provide the basis for workloads and workload profiles.
4) CONFIGURING THE TEST ENVIRONMENT Plan with a conceptual approach, open tools, designed tests along with testing environment before the performance. The output of this stage is set load-generation environment and resource-monitoring tools.
5) EXECUTE THE TESTS Create the Performance study reports containing all performance characteristics of the application. Based on the analysis, prepare a proposal report.
7) ANALYZE RESULTS, REPORT, AND RETEST Based on the test report re-prioritize the test & re-execute the same. If any specific test result within the defined metric limit & all results are within the thresholds limits, then testing of the same situation on appropriate configuration is finished.
CONCLUSION For the success of the Software system, Performance testing plays a vital role in software testing life cycle.