Performance and Load Testing Services using Cloud Computing

The challenge

According to recent research from the Aberdeen Group, a delay in website page loading by even one second can impact conversions by 7% and customer satisfaction by 16%.

The report also found that the average online business had 8 days of downtime a year due to performance issues leading to lost revenues.

On the other hand adding too much capacity to your hosting can be expensive and perhaps misapplied if your site is by and large performing well except for certain components or under certain combination of conditions. Functional testing is not comprehensive enough to identify all the combinations a site will be subjected to and its performance under stress conditions. Moreover, the dynamic nature of traffic pattern on a web site is dependent on a number of factors including:

• Performance testing to verify site behavior requires heavy capital investment in equipment and software
• Personnel responsible for performing these tests require a special training than those doing the traditional functional and operational testing
• Testing best practices are still evolving since the web dynamics are changing rapidly and requires incorporation of the evolving nuances to be considered
• Almost 24/7 operations and shortened release cycles aka constant beta syndrome requires these tests to be run frequently and independently to get the assurance that the "new" release will perform s well as the last one

Trigent’s QA and Test Services using Cloud – Amazon’s EC2 services

Trigent’s Cloud based performance testing service leverages its proven testing expertise with the scalability and proven reliability of Amazon’s EC2 cloud via a technology partnership with Amazon. Combining one the world’s largest networks with a judicious mix of Trigent’s tools and methodology, we can now offer the best in class testing services to web businesses and web sites.

The start up time for this service is very quick and there is no up front capital outlay required by our clients. Cost benefits are tremendous – no up front capital investment is required from our clients. The only cost is the cost of services associated with the actual testing services. We provide all the tools and technology infrastructure, test planning, test case writing and execution services for a flat service fee.

Service Description

We have created a cloud based simulator in order to emulate the various traffic patterns required under various conditions faced by the web site. Once these test requirements are captured and designed into the test cases, they are executed over the cloud to hit your web site and capture results.

We can emulate users’ buying behavior based on the market type/condition, buying event, circumstances and time of the day. For example, some users would enter and finish the transaction and exit within 3 minutes. Some would want to exhaustively search and then decide what to do. Some would spend days browsing before using the shopping cart. Test planning and intelligent building of test scripts allow the team to simulate these different users.

Parameterized test scripts allow the test team and business users to change the load in steps, time between ramp up, target load, mix of types of users and other variables without programming effort.

The number of runs for each test scenario can be controlled by experience and best practices that come with testing these types of applications for different industries and markets. For instance, the requirements and test plan for a charity website that is open for a day for donors that wish to contribute for a cause could be very different compared to a fashion products site that launches a new range for the summer season.

Trigent can also designs the test plan and test scripts to simulate these different scenarios for lean organization that may want to take over the testing by themselves and configure tests themselves. The entire test plan, harness and scripts are designed for ease of change by customers who may not be very technical or may not want to spend effort in programming.

Browser and platform compatibility services are also built into Trigent’s test processes.

The service deliverables include Performance Test Scenarios, Automation Scripts and Application Test Reports.

What do customers get from Trigent’s testing services?

In summary, using Trigent’s Web QA services customers are able to:

• Test web applications faster, sufficiently and at a lower cost
• Use best in class tools that meet test requirements and are not expensive, like Open Sources tools and Cloud based infrastructure (Amazon EC2 services)
• Simulate the extensive infrastructure for load testing easily
• Remove dependence on internal users from testing work
• Lower overall costs for testing by using Trigent’s outsourced offshore team that can ramp up and down with market needs
• Obtain overall savings of up to 60%

Who has used Trigent’s WebQA Services?

• The nation’s leading apartment rental site has used Trigent’s services to manage their development, QA and testing for several years.
• Gaming websites use Trigent Performance Testing services to validate performance during peak loads.
• E-Retailers have used Trigent’s services to ensure that functionality does not break with simultaneous users conducting intense e-commerce transactions on the site during holiday buying.
• Not for profit organizations use Trigent’s Performance Testing to ensure that thousands of donors converging on the site during a 4-5 hour charity drive are not disappointed, see slow performance or erratic functionality while making a donation.