LoadRunner Frequently Asked Questions

Maintained by Mark McWhinney, msm@powertest.comVersion 1.0April 24, 2003

LoadRunner Discussion Group.................................................................................................................... 1What is the purpose of this group?...........................................................................................................1What types of messages are allowed?.....................................................................................................1Is the discussion moderated?.................................................................................................................. 1

Learning LoadRunner.................................................................................................................................. 1How can I learn to use LoadRunner?.......................................................................................................1What do I need to know to do load testing in addition to knowing how to use the LoadRunner tool?......2Where can I get help?.............................................................................................................................. 2

Applications................................................................................................................................................. 2What protocols does LoadRunner support?.............................................................................................2What can I monitor with LoadRunner?.....................................................................................................3How many users can I emulate with LoadRunner on a PC?....................................................................4How much memory is needed per user?..................................................................................................4

Product........................................................................................................................................................ 4Can I get a evaluation copy of LoadRunner?...........................................................................................4What is the current shipping version of LoadRunner?..............................................................................4What is the difference between LoadRunner and Astra LoadTest?.........................................................4What is the relation between LoadRunner and Topaz?...........................................................................4How much does LoadRunner cost?.........................................................................................................4Where can I buy LoadRunner?................................................................................................................4

LoadRunner Discussion GroupWhat is the purpose of this group?Discussion of issues related to Mercury Interac-tive's LoadRunner load testing tool.

What types of messages are allowed?Any question or constructive comment about technical issues related to LoadRunner or per-formance management in general is good. Job postings for positions primarily involving the use of LoadRunner are OK. Messages should be in English.

Messages about issues unrelated to LoadRun-ner, postings for unrelated jobs, and personal at-tacks are not OK. Requests for license keys or answers for the CPS exam are not allowed and are reported to Mercury, so please do not ask.

"How-to" questions related to information that can be easily found by reading the LoadRunner documentation are discouraged.

Is the discussion moderated?Sort of. Anyone can join the discussion group without approval and can post a message with-out review. However, the moderator may re-move messages or ban members without notice if there are abuses.

Learning LoadRunnerHow can I learn to use LoadRunner?Mercury Interactive offers courses at their facility in Sunnyvale and other US cities. They also can conduct courses at your site. Mercury has certi-fied training partners that also offer classroom training.

Some community colleges and for-profit training companies offer LoadRunner courses as well.

The hardcopy and PDF documentation that is shipped with LoadRunner is fairly good. You

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can learn the tool and something about load testing by reading the documentation, but it is best to take at least an introductory class first. Mercury does not send documentation to non-customers.

What do I need to know to do load testing in addition to knowing how to use the Load-Runner tool?Unlike functional testing you need to know more than just how the application under test func-tions. You need to know how the components behind the client work and what the performance issues for the components are.

Specifically, you need to know the following knowledge and skills:

Components such as web servers, application servers, database servers, operating systems, networks and network elements such as load balancers. You need not have "guru" level knowledge of each of the components but should have operational knowledge and an un-derstanding of the performance issues associ-ated with the components. For example, a load tester should know what multi-way joins, indexes and spin counts are and what affect they have on a database server.

Protocol(s) used between the client and server such as HTTP/HTML, ODBC, SQL*NET, and DCOM.

C. The LoadRunner script language is ANSI C. It helps to know the C language, but the scripts are generated and manipulated by LoadRunner, so there is usually not need to directly edit the code. There is also a icon script view which completely hides the C code.

Communication. Load testing is not a heads down coding exercise. You will work with many parts of an organization to coordinate activities, schedules and resources. Daily interaction with a variety of people requires good oral and writ-ten communication skills as well as good people skills. If you prefer to sit in a cube by yourself, you should stay in functional testing or develop-ment.

Where can I get help?Mercury Interactive Customer Support Site. Visit Mercury Interactive's customer support site (http://support.mercuryinteractive.com) for sup-

port hours, contact information, and other impor-tant information about customer support. Use the site to submit support service requests on-line, and to access knowledge base articles, user discussion forums, patches, on-line docu-mentation and the latest product information. This is available to only customers.

Mercury Interactive Web Site. Visit Mercury In-teractive at (http://www.mercuryinteractive.com) for information on new products, events, a list of local distributors, and more. This is available to the public.

Mercury Interactive Phone Support. You can get phone support between 6 AM and 5 PM Pacific Time at (877) TEST-HLP or locally at (408) 822-5400. This is available to only customers.

ApplicationsWhat protocols does LoadRunner support?LoadRunner ships with support for the following protocols. Other protocols are available but are not necessarily full supported.

E-BusinessFTPLDAPWeb/Winsocket Dual ProtocolPalmSOAPWeb (HTTP/HTML)

Wirelessi-modeVoiceXMLWAP

StreamingMedia Player (MMS)Real

Mailing ServicesInternet Messaging (IMAP)MS Exchange (MAPI)POP3SMTP

Enterprise Java BeansEnterprise Java Beans (EJB)Rmi-Java

Distributed ComponentsCOM/DCOMCorba-JavaRmi-Java

MiddlewareJacadaTuxedo 6Tuxedo 7

ERPBaanOracle NCA

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PeopleSoft - TuxedoSiebel - DB2 CLISiebel - OracleSiebel - MSSQLSAP

Client/ServerDB2 CLIDomain Name Resolution (DNS)InformixMS SQL ServerODBCOracle (2-Tier)Sybase CtLibSybase DblibWindows Sockets

LegacyTerminal Emulation (RTE)

CustomC VuserJavascript VuserJava VuserVB Script VuserVB Vuser

What can I monitor with LoadRunner?LoadRunner ships with support for the following components. Other monitors are available but are not necessarily full supported.

Client-side MonitorsEnd-to-end transaction monitors - Provide end-user response times, hits per second, transac-tions per second.

Virtual User Status User-defined Data Point Transaction Response Time Transaction per Second (Passed) Transaction per Second (Failed) Web Transaction breakdown Graphs Hits per Second Throughput HTTP Responses per Second Pages Downloaded per Second

Server MonitorsNT/UNIX/Linux monitors - Provide hardware, network and operating system performance met-rics, such as CPU, memory and network throughput.

NT server resources UNIX / Linux server monitor

Load Appliances Performance Monitors

Antara.net

Application Deployment Solutions

Citrix MetaFrame (available only for Load-Runner)

Network Monitors

Network delay monitor - Provides a break-down of the network segments between client and server, as well as network delays.

SNMP monitor - Provides performance data for network devices such as bridges and routers.

Web Server Performance MonitorsWeb server monitors - Provide performance data inside the Web servers, such as active connec-tions, hits per second, etc.

Apache Microsoft IIS iPlanet (NES)

Web Application Server Performance MonitorsWeb application server monitor - Provides per-formance data inside the Web application server, such as connections per second, active database connections, etc.

BroadVision Allaire ColdFusion Microsoft Active Server Pages SilverStream BEA WebLogic (via SNMP) BEA WebLogic (via JMX) IBM WebSphere iPlanet Application Server Oracle 9iAS HTTP Server Ariba ATG Dynamo

Streaming Media Performance MonitorsStreaming specific monitors for measuring the end user quality on the client side, and isolate performance bottlenecks on the server-side.

Microsoft Windows Media Server Real Networks RealServer

Firewall Server Resource Monitors

CheckPoint FireWall-1

Database Server Resource Monitors

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Database monitor - Provides performance data inside the database, such as active database connections, etc.

SQL Server Oracle DB2 Sybase

ERP Performance Monitors

SAP R/3 Monitor

Java Performance Monitors

TowerJ JProbe J2EE Performance Monitor

Middleware Performance Monitors

Tuxedo - Provides performance data inside a BEA Tuxedo application server, such as current requests in queue.

IBM WebSphere MQ (MQSeries) (available only for LoadRunner)

In addition to these monitors, LoadRunner also supports user defined monitors which allows you to easily integrate the results from other mea-surement tools with LoadRunner data collection.

How many users can I emulate with Load-Runner on a PC?This greatly depends on the configuration of the PC (number of CPUs, CPU speed, memory and operating system), the protocol(s) used, the size and complexity of the script(s), the frequency of execution (iteration pacing and think times) and the amount of logging.

How much memory is needed per user?You can get some approximation of the memory needs by looking at the "LR 7.02 footprints.pdf" file located on the LoadRunner discussion group at groups.yahoo.com/group/LoadRunner/files.

ProductCan I get a evaluation copy of LoadRunner?No. Mercury does not ship evaluation copies of LoadRunner. You can contact Mercury or a Mercury reseller to get a demo at your site or via Webex.

What is the current shipping version of Load-Runner?7.6

What is the difference between LoadRunner and Astra LoadTest?Astra LoadTest is another load test tool from Mercury Interactive built specifically for testing web applications. Relative to LoadRunner it: Supports only HTTP and HTTPS protocols. Has less functionality. Uses the VBScript scripting language. Has a larger footprint (~ 5 MBytes). Costs less. Is easier to learn.

In that LoadRunner supports web applications plus much more, it is the preferred tool for load testing web applications. The exception is if the load testers are non-technical (bad idea) or the load test project's budget is too limited to afford LoadRunner.

What is the relation between LoadRunner and Topaz?Topaz is Mercury Interactive's line of products and hosted services for monitoring applications after deployment to production. The Topaz products are built with LoadRunner technology and use the same script recorder. Scripts built for load testing with LoadRunner can be used by Topaz for monitoring without modification.

How much does LoadRunner cost?The main cost drivers for a LoadRunner license are the number of users to be simulated and number and type of protocols used. You will need to talk a sales representative to price out the various components.

The total cost of LoadRunner typically runs from USD$50,000 to $100,000 or more.

Maintenance cost is 18% of the total list price. The maintenance includes new LoadRunner re-leases, patches, phone support and access to the support web site.

Where can I buy LoadRunner?LoadRunner is sold by Mercury Interactive and by authorized resellers.

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