Performance Test Report: Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 · PDF filethe built-in open source printing system . The renderer supports Open ... Performance Test Report: ... Console or

Table of Contents page

Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22. Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23. Configurable Test Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34. Test Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35. Test Lab Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46. Tested Scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57. Comparisons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78. Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Performance Test Report: Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.1

White PaperMicro Focus iPrint

2

White PaperPerformance Test Report: Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.1

The Micro Focus iPrint Appliance ecosystem contains multiple Windows renderers, including single- and dual-core based Windows renderers . The primary relationships between print traffic and Micro Focus iPrint Appliance are job-rendering and job-wait times . To establish these re-lationships, testers used the Micro Focus iPrint server’s built-in audit log to track job submissions, rendering times, formats and sizes . This document contains information about the test environment, the tests and the test results .

NOTE: Micro Focus iPrint exists as both a part of Micro Focus Open Enterprise Server and as a stand-alone software appliance . The tests in this document are applicable only to Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .1 .

1. IntroductionThis document provides information about performance results from several tests we conducted . The report focuses on the times it took to print jobs that a mobile device submitted to a printer . In each test, Micro Focus iPrint Appliance receives a print job from a mobile client and sends it to one or more internal or external renderers to convert the job to a print-ready state . Testers considered several parameters for running these tests:

Print job size

Print job format

Internal rendering

External rendering

Multiple external renderings

CPU- and file I/O-intensive security-compliance applications such as antivirus software .

Testers incorporated antivirus software during testing and used the built-in Micro Focus iPrint auditing function to derive test results .

The results in this report do not indicate internal or external renderers’ maximum performance capabilities . We conducted the tests to achieve the following goals:

Understand rendering performance in different job submission scenarios

Arrive at the optimal number of Windows renderers required for different job loads

2. OverviewMicro Focus iPrint eliminates complex printing environments . It is avail-able as a virtual appliance that offers cross-platform, self-service printing for the enterprise . Micro Focus iPrint allows users to send documents to any printer via a web browser from their desktop, laptop or mobile device . It also integrates with your Active Directory or Micro Focus eDirectory™ en vironment to provide seamless authentication for your users .

Micro Focus iPrint can save your IT department time and money by sig-nificantly reducing the management burden normally required for mixed fleets of Windows, Mac and Linux desktops . It works across the major mo-bile platforms as well, meaning IT only has to manage a single print solu-tion for all of your organization’s endpoints . It works with your current users in Active Directory or Micro Focus eDirectory to provide authentication .

Micro Focus iPrint scales exceptionally well, which reduces the server infrastructure you need to maintain hundreds or thousands of printers, thus lowering your network bandwidth costs . You can mobilize your existing fleet of printers rather than buying new ones and you can imple-ment print monitoring to track printing costs . With user self-provisioning of network printers, you can reduce helpdesk expenses because of fewer calls for printer help .

Executive SummaryThis report presents Micro Focus® iPrint® Appliance job-rendering performance results that our testers observed while conducting tests to capture and illustrate the relationships between typical print-traffic scenarios and Micro Focus iPrint Appliance ecosystems . Several variables can contribute to print traffic, including job volumes, specific formats and submission rates .

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Using a web browser, users working at desktops or laptops can choose printers on a graphical office map . The map shows the location and details of every printer in the company (both local and global) . Users can begin printing with just a few mouse clicks—no training required . Users on Windows, Mac and Linux can send print jobs through Micro Focus iPrint to both new and legacy printers from all the major print vendors, without worrying about print drivers .

Mobile PrintingPrinting normally requires drivers to convert documents into printer-ready languages . Some vendors use cloud services to convert docu-ments from mobile devices, but Micro Focus iPrint Appliance does not require you to send documents through a cloud service and does not require any specific hardware . By keeping information out of the cloud, Micro Focus iPrint Appliance is more secure . It also allows users to use their current infrastructures and avoids vendor lock in . Micro Focus iPrint Appliance contains its own rendering and conversion capabilities, which allow it to receive print jobs from a variety of mobile sources .

For more information, see the Micro Focus iPrint Appliance Administration Guide at: www.novell.com/documentation/iprint-appliance1/

3. Configurable Test VariablesTesters used the following parameters and conditions for the tests:

Job Size: Testers considered file sizes ranging from a few KBs to MBs . They tested on both external and internal renderers and incorporated various file sizes into the test matrix to understand typical wait times for users submitting these jobs .

Job Format: Testers used different job formats to study time-taken-to-render performance with internal and external renderers .

Internal Rendering: Micro Focus iPrint Appliance is bundled with an internal document renderer . The internal renderer converts documents to the PDF format, which is then translated into a print-ready format using the built-in open source printing system . The renderer supports Open Office, Microsoft Office and image formats, and it also supports multi-threaded rendering to handle heavy loads . For more information about the file types the renderer supports, see the Micro Focus iPrint Appliance Administration Guide at: www.novell.com/documentation/iprint- appliance1/

External Rendering: You can only configure the option to use an exter-nal renderer on a Windows system that has additional software such as Adobe Acrobat X Pro, Microsoft Office, or an Micro Focus iPrint render-ing client registered to Micro Focus iPrint Appliance . Because this setup contains two different applications, testers tested the supported formats for both applications . Adobe supports Portable Document Format (PDF) and Microsoft Office supports several proprietary and open source for-mats . For more information about Micro Focus iPrint Appliance formats for Windows Office, see the Micro Focus iPrint Appliance Administration Guide at: www.novell.com/documentation/iprint-appliance1/

Multiple External Rendering: Micro Focus iPrint Appliance supports multiple external renderers, which means your administrators can reg-ister one or more Windows instances to Micro Focus iPrint Appliance . This type of Micro Focus iPrint Appliance configuration does not incur additional format support . The rendering time improves with the addi-tion of each external renderer, thereby reducing the time taken to print . For more information on performance improvements with additional renderers, see section 6, “Tested Scenarios .”

Antivirus Applications: You install Micro Focus iPrint renderers on Windows machines . Enterprises usually have several applications in-stalled on systems for security compliance—antivirus (AV) solutions, for example . AV scans are processor intensive, so testers ran tests on Micro Focus iPrint Windows renderers with AV solutions installed and running .

Job Submission Rates: Normal Load: Testers created and submitted jobs of different

volumes for a period of one hour (60 minutes)—100 jobs per hour and 500 jobs per hour, for example . They emulated this job traffic from the current page per minute (PPM) handling capability of enterprise-class printers, defining these loads as normal loads .

Peak Load: By definition, peak-load traffic occurs over a short duration during which job-submission rates are very high, thereby stressing the printing subsystem and increasing users’ wait times . The purpose of this test was to capture the wait time for the last job across single to multiple renderers . Testers tested peak loads of 100–1000 jobs .

4. Test MethodologyTesters’ primary objective was to show the results of different appliance setups pertaining to different factors—such as multiple renderers and hardware requirements—that would help improve job wait times . Areas

http://www.novell.com/documentation/iprint-appliance1/



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outside the test scope included mail-arrival latency and network band-width between mobile devices and the Micro Focus iPrint Appliance server . Rather than include these areas in their job-submission work-flows, testers identified areas over which Micro Focus iPrint Appliance has control in the submission process to uncover potential bottlenecks and understand the impacts of having additional resources, such as multiple processors .

NOTE: Testers used this test environment to its maximum potential . The numbers they achieved with these tests provide a good inference pattern that can help companies decide on their ideal setups .

To obtain accurate results and ensure their reliability, testers used the following methods:

1. Due to the controlled nature of the setup, testers considered alternative print methods that simulate a print job submission from the Micro Focus iPrint mobile app to the Micro Focus iPrint Appliance . The job submission mechanism must be tested in a con-trolled environment to calculate accurate reference values . Testers did not consider email jobs because several factors can lead to in-consistent email transaction times in enterprise email subsystems, thereby causing inaccuracy in reference values .

2. Testers recorded the time until print gateways submitted the jobs to the printers . Because print time depends on the printer’s make and model, testers did not account for this time .

3. The test bed and setup used a 1 GBps LAN network .

4. Testers used VMware ESXi 5 .5 for deploying all appliances in the test .

5. Testers used the Windows 7 Enterprise 64-bit operating system created as a virtual machine for configuring external renderers .

6. Testers submitted jobs using iprintman via IPP to emulate normal-load and peak-load job traffic .

7. Testers used audit logs for each participating printer to capture these parameters:

a. Job_submission_time

b. Job_completion_time Using a and b, testers calculated:

c. Wait time for jobs

d. Total submission time

8. Peak load tests submitted jobs continuously until the jobs reached a count limit .

9. Testers also used mixed sets of jobs that included both types of loads (normal and peak) for file types belonging to both internal and external renderers . The ratio of each category was as follows:

a. 60 percent jobs for external renderer (50 percent PDF and 50 percent Microsoft Office documents)

b. 40 percent jobs for internal renderer (75 percent images and 25 percent Open Office documents)

NOTE: Testers did not perform management functions with Manage ment Console or iManager when tests were running .

5. Test Lab DesignTest Bed

IMPORTANT: Make sure that Micro Focus iPrint Appliance running in ESX server has sufficient physical memory available . As a best practice, the ESX server hosting this appliance should have around 2 GB of ad-ditional free memory .

Server Hardware DetailsTesters used machines with single-core and dual-core CPUs for testing:

MICRO FOCUS iPRINT APPLIANCE

Table 5-1: Server Specifications

Internal Renderer Internal renderer

External Renderer Configuration

Windows 7 Enterprise 64-bit configured with Microsoft Office 2010 Standard Edition

Adobe Acrobat X Pro Symantec antivirus client

Tools Micro Focus iPrint audit logs

Client Servers Modified iprintman for job submission in five different servers

Number of scenarios tested Six

Test Server Micro Focus iPrint Appliance

Server Role Appliance Server

Make and Model Open Virtualization Format (OVF) deployed in VMware ESX running on Dell PowerEdge R510

CPUs/Cores 1

Memory 4 GB

Operating System Modified Micro Focus Open Enterprise Server 11 SP2 with mobile Micro Focus iPrint RPM

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Table 5-2: ESX Server Hardware Details

EXTERNAL RENDERER

Table 5-3: Workstation Specifications

Table 5-4: ESX Hardware Configuration

6. Tested ScenariosUnless otherwise specified, the printing and wait times listed in the following tables are in minutes, rounded to the nearest whole minute .

Printing Time for Set of 10 Jobs for Multiple Windows Renderers, with Fixed Period of 60 MinutesTesters performed this test with the following variables:

Mixed set of 10 different jobs:

– 5 PDFs (1 MB, 2 MB, 3 MB, 4 MB, 5 MB)

– 2 DOC (500 KB, 1 MB)

– 1 XLS (100 KB)

– 2 PPT (1 MB, 2 MB)

Number of external renderers: Tested with 1, 2 and 3

Number of jobs: Tested with 100, 200, 300, 500, 750 and 1000 jobs submitted over an hour

Table 6-1: Results

Print Time for Mixed Set of Jobs (Internal and External Renderers), Normal Load for Different Job VolumesTesters performed the test with the following variables:


– 3 PDFs (3 MB, 4 MB, 5 MB)

– 1 DOC (1 MB)

– 1 XLS (100 KB)

– 1 PPT (2 MB)

– 1 ODT (100 KB)

– 3 images (JPG, TIF, PNG–3 MB, 5 MB, 5 MB)

Test Server Renderer

Server Role Windows renderer

Make and Model Virtualized Windows 7 in VMware ESX abstracted on Dell PowerEdge R510

CPUs/Cores 1

Memory 4 GB

Operating System Windows 7 Enterprise 64-bit on ESX server

CPU Intel Xeon 2 .7 GHz processor 6 processor cores per socket

Memory 16 GB

Hard Disk 925 GB

LAN Speed 1 GBps

CPU Intel Xeon 2 .4 GHz processor 4 processor cores per socket

Memory 8 GB

LAN Speed 1 GBps

Number of Jobs per 60 Minutes

1 External Renderer

2 External Renderers

3 External Renderers

100

Print Time

Wait Time for 100th Job

60

0

60

0

60

0

200

Print Time


60

0

60

0

60

0

300

Print Time


60

1

60

0

60

0

500

Print Time


88

32

71

0

60

0

750

Print Time


132

77

73

2

60

1

1000

Print Time


174

115

90

47

64

2

6


Number of external renderers: Tested with 1

Number of jobs: Tested with 200, 500, 750 and 1000 jobs submitted over an hour

Table 6-2: Results

Print Time for PDF Jobs, with Fixed Period of 60 Minutes, for Different Job VolumesTesters performed this test with the following variables:

Number of files: 8 PDFs

Size of jobs: 100 KB, 500 KB, 1 MB, 2 MB, 3 MB, 4 MB, 5 MB and 10 MB

Number of jobs: Tested with 1000 jobs submitted over an hour

Table 6-3: Results

Print Time for Mixed Set of Nine Jobs for Client and Server Versions of Windows Renderer, with Fixed Period of 60 MinutesTesters performed this test with the following variables:

Mixed set of nine different jobs:

– 3 PDFs (3 MB, 4 MB, 5 MB)

– 1 DOC (1MB)

– 1 XLS (100 KB)

– 1 ODT (100 KB)

– 3 images (JPG, TIF, PNG–3 MB, 5 MB, 5 MB)


Number of jobs: Tested with 200, 500, 750 and 1000 jobs submitted over an hour

Table 6-4: Results


Print Time

Wait Time for Last Job

200 60 0

500 82 22

750 123 62

1000 161 98


Internal Renderer

Built-in PDF Renderer

Adobe Acrobat X Pro

1000

Print Time


69

1

253

186

131

63


External Renderer (Windows Server 2008 R2)

External Renderer (Windows 7)

200

Print Time


60

10 Seconds

60

30 Seconds

500

Print Time


100

40

91

35

750

Print Time


150

89

135

72

1000 Print Time


201

140

188

125

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With most organizations, company policies mandate security applica-tions like antivirus, monitoring tools and so forth . Testers found that antivirus client scans are the most CPU and file I/O intensive, so tes-ters checked the impact on rendering performance while an antivirus scan was running . They concluded that with a single-core system, data indicates performance degradation, whereas with a dual-core system, the results were comparable to the results seen for tests run without antivirus scans running .

Average Print Time for Different File Formats and Different File and Page SizesThe following table provides an idea of the time it took Micro Focus iPrint Appliance to print different file formats:

Table 6-5: File Formats

7. ComparisonsTesters have compared Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .0 and Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .1 . They compared the following two attributes from the tests, keeping all other attributes (job load and document format) constant .

Total print time

Total wait time for last job

The internal and external renderers in Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .1 have been improved since Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .0 . In Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .1, the internal renderer has been updated with improved software and the external renderer now comes with a built-in PDF renderer . This is an improvement from Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .0, in which Adobe Acrobat Pro was required by the external renderer to render PDF documents . Because of these improvements, testers only compared results for printing with Windows renderers, as the changes between the two versions mean further testing to compare Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .0 and 1 .1 would not be valid .

Unless otherwise specified, the print and wait times listed in the follow-ing tables are in minutes, rounded to the nearest whole minute .

Comparison of Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.0 and Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.1, Print Time for Set of 10 Jobs for Multiple Windows Renderers, with Fixed Period of 60 MinutesTesters performed this test with the following variables:


– 5 PDFs (1 MB, 2 MB, 3 MB, 4 MB, 5 MB)

– 2 DOC (500 KB, 1 MB)

– 1 XLS (100 KB)

– 2 PPT (1 MB, 2 MB)


Number of jobs: Tested with 100, 200, 300, 500, 750 and 1000 submitted over an hour

Table 7-1: Results

File Size

File Formats

Total Pages

Total Print Time in Seconds

100 KB ODT 51 81

100 KB XLS — 63

1 MB DOC 250 87

3 MB PDF 112 94

4 MB PDF 262 113

5 MB PDF 8 26

3 MB TIF 1 9

5 MB JPEG 1 98

5 MB PNG 1 71


1 External Renderer 1.0


2 External Renderers 1.0




100 60 60 60 60 60 60

200 60 60 60 60 60 60

300 70 60 60 60 60 60

500 116 88 63 71 60 60

750 172 132 94 73 60 60

1000 234 174 195 90 69 64

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Comparison of Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.0 and Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.1, Wait Time for Last Job, Set of 10 Jobs for Multiple Windows Renderers, with Fixed Period of 60 MinutesTesters performed this test with the following variables:


– 5 PDFs (1 MB, 2 MB, 3 MB, 4 MB, 5 MB)

– 2 DOC (500 KB, 1 MB)

– 1 XLS (100 KB)

– 2 PPT (1 MB, 2 MB)


Number of jobs: Tested with 100, 200, 300, 500, 750 and 1000 submitted over an hour

Table 7-2: Results

8. ConclusionsWe classify Micro Focus iPrint Appliance performance into three dif-ferent categories . Each category has an average-load and peak-load handling capability—which have been derived from the test results de-scribed above—for maintaining Quality of Service (QoS) . QoS refers to the wait time to print a job . Testers calculated average loads for job submissions in a 10-hour window per day . The loads calculated for in-creased job-submission rates over short spans of time are termed peak loads . Section 4 “Test Methodology” and Section 5 “Test Lab Design” mention the test environment and methodologies .

In the following table, the time Micro Focus iPrint Appliance took to render a single print job ranges from 1-180 seconds, depending on the average load for each category .

For example, if your print environment falls into Category 1 as defined in the table, and the average load is up to 1500 print jobs per day, then the time taken to render a single print job is one second . As the average load increases to 2000 jobs per day, the time taken to render a single print job increases, and can go up to 180 seconds depending on the job size .

Testers saw improved performance for Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .1 compared with Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 .0 in all three of the categories .








100 0 0 0 0 0 0

200 0 0 0 0 0 0

300 10 1 0 0 0 0

500 56 32 3 0 0 0

750 112 77 34 2 0 1

1000 174 115 65 40 9 2

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Table 8-1: Load Handling Capability, Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1.1

Micro Focus iPrint Appliance modularity has the ability to maintain ren-dering time under acceptable limits by scaling up external renderers . Testers achieved better rendering performance when they optimized wait times for increased job volumes by adding external renderers . Average-load test results with single and multiple renderers define Micro Focus iPrint Appliance job-handling capabilities, which can help administrators determine the number of external renderers your organization will require for optimally handling print loads within acceptable job wait times .

Peak-load test results provide an overview of the wait time for the last job for single and multiple renderers with varying job volumes . These

results can help administrators more precisely determine the number of external renderers your organization will need, depending on the occurrence of peak loads in your environment .

Based on the data they collected for the most likely printing scenarios, Our testers have plotted charts and graphs to help your system ad-ministrators understand external renderer requirements for an optimal rendering experience .

For more information, see the Micro Focus iPrint Appliance Administration Guide at: www.novell.com/documentation/iprint-appliance1/

Category Setup Average Load Peak Load Category 1 Micro Focus iPrint Appliance

+ 1 External Renderer 2000–2700 jobs per day

200–270 jobs in 60 minutes

Category 2 Micro Focus iPrint Appliance + 2 External Renderers

4000–5000 jobs per day


Category 3 Micro Focus iPrint Appliance + 4 External Renderers

5000–10,000 jobs per day


About Micro Focus

Since 1976, Micro Focus has helped more than 20,000 custom-ers unlock the value of their business logic by creating enabling solutions that bridge the gap from well-established technologies to modern functionality . The two portfolios work to a single, clear vision—to deliver innovative products supported by exceptional cus-tomer service . www.microfocus.com



http://www.microfocus.com

162-000019-001 | N | 08/15 | © 2015 Micro Focus . All rights reserved . Micro Focus, the Micro Focus logo, eDirectory, and iPrint, among others, are trademarks or registered trademarks of Micro Focus or its subsidiaries or affiliated companies in the United Kingdom, United States and other countries . All other marks are the property of their respective owners .

Micro FocusUK HeadquartersUnited Kingdom+44 (0) 1635 565200

U.S. HeadquartersProvo, Utah801 861 4272888 321 4272

Additional contact information and office locations: www.novell.com

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Performance Test Report: Micro Focus iPrint Appliance 1 · PDF filethe built-in open source printing system . The renderer supports Open ... Performance Test Report: ... Console or