Wednesday, April 6, 2011

HP LoadRunner Licensing

When you purchase LoadRunner, you receive a custom license for your
configuration and needs. You can access this information at any time
through the LoadRunner Launcher. To preview your license key
information, choose Start > Programs > LoadRunner to open the
LoadRunner Launcher. Select LoadRunner License from the Launcher’s
Configuration menu.
When you purchase a license for Service Test, you install it through the
License Manager (Start > Programs > LoadRunner > Service Test > License
Manager). The license can be a Seat license (host lock) or a Concurrent
license (site license). For more information, see the HP LoadRunner
Installation Guide.
HP Service Test is available as a standalone product or as an extension to HP
LoadRunner's Virtual User Generator, VuGen. Service Test contains all of the
capabilities of VuGen with added functionality in the area of SOA and Web
Service testing.
HP Service Test is a functional testing tool and therefore provides more
functional testing features than VuGen. In addition, Service Test contains
several utilities that allow working with WSDLs, XML, and SOAP.
All scripts created in HP Service Test can run in HP LoadRunner and HP
Performance Center. This compatibility exists only when Service Test and
LoadRunner are of the same version.

The Steps of Creating Vuser Scripts

The process of creating a Vuser script is as follows:
1 Record a basic script using VuGen. If you are testing Windows-based GUI
applications or complex Web environments such as applets and Flash,
you may need to use HP’s GUI-based tools such as WinRunner and
QuickTest Professional.
2 Enhance the basic script by adding control-flow statements and other
LoadRunner API functions into the script.
3 Configure the run-time settings. These settings include iteration, log, and
timing information, and define the Vuser behavior during a script run.
4 Verify the script’s functionality, run it in standalone mode.
5 After you verify that the script is functional, you integrate it into your
environment: a LoadRunner scenario, Performance Center load test, or
Business Process Monitor profile. For more information, see the HP
LoadRunner Controller, HP Performance Center, or HP Business Availibility
Center User Guides.

Looking at Vuser Types

VuGen provides a variety of Vuser technologies that allow you to emulate
your system. Each technology is suited to a particular architecture and
results in a specific type of Vuser script. For example, you use Web Vuser
Scripts to emulate users operating Web browsers. You use FTP Vusers to
emulate an FTP session. The various Vuser technologies can be used alone or
together, to create effective load tests or Business Process Monitor profiles.

The Vuser types are divided into the following categories:
➤ All Protocols. A list of all supported protocols in alphabetical order
➤ Application Deployment Solution. For the Citrix and Microsoft Remote
Desktop Protocol (RDP) protocols
➤ Client/Server. For DB2 CLI, DNS, Informix, Microsoft .NET, MS SQL,
ODBC, Oracle (2-tier), Sybase Ctlib, Sybase Dblib, and Windows
Sockets protocols
➤ Custom. For C template, Java template, Javascript, VB script, VBNet,
and VB template type scripts
➤ Distributed Components. For COM/DCOM, and Microsoft .NET
protocols
➤ E-business. For AJAX (Click and Script), AMF, Flex, FTP, LDAP,
Microsoft .NET, Web (Click and Script), Web (HTTP/HTML), and Web
Services protocols
➤ ERP/CRM. For Oracle NCA, Oracle Web Applications 11i, Peoplesoft
Enterprise, Peoplesoft-Tuxedo, SAP-Web, SAPGUI, SAP (Click and
Script), and Siebel Web protocols
➤ Enterprise Java Beans. For EJB Testing
➤ Java. For the Java Record/Replay protocol
➤ Legacy. For Terminal Emulation (RTE)
➤ Mailing Services. Internet Messaging (IMAP), MS Exchange (MAPI),
Post Office Protocol (POP3), and Simple Mail Protocol (SMTP)
➤ Middleware. For the Tuxedo protocol
➤ Streaming. For MediaPlayer (MMS) and RealPlayer protocols
➤ Wireless. For Multimedia Messaging Service (MM) and WAP protocols
To view a list of all supported protocols in alphabetical order, select File >
New and select All Protocols in the Category list box.
Note: In order to run the various protocols, you must have either a global
license or licenses for the desired protocols. For more information, select
Configuration > LoadRunner License in the LoadRunner Launcher (Start >
Programs > LoadRunner > LoadRunner).

Introducing Vusers

Vusers emulate the actions of human users by performing typical business
processes in your application. The actions that a Vuser performs during the
recording session are described in a Vuser script.

HP’s tool for creating Vuser scripts is the Virtual User Generator, VuGen. You
use VuGen to develop a Vuser script by recording a user performing typical
business processes on a client application. VuGen records the actions that
you perform during the recording session, recording only the activity
between the client and the server. Instead of having to manually program
the application’s API function calls to the server, VuGen automatically
generates functions that accurately model and emulate real world situations.

During recording VuGen monitors the client end of the database and traces
all the requests sent by the user and received from the user, to the server.










During playback, Vuser scripts communicate directly with the server by
executing calls to the server API. When a Vuser communicates directly with
a server, system resources are not required for the client interface. This lets
you run a large number of Vusers simultaneously on a single workstation,
and enables you to use only a few testing machines to emulate large server
loads.







In addition, since Vuser scripts do not rely on client software, you can use
Vusers to check server performance even before the user interface of the
client software has been fully developed.

Using VuGen, you can run scripts as standalone tests. Running scripts from
VuGen is useful for debugging as it enables you to see how a Vuser will
behave and which enhancements need to be made.

VuGen enables you to record a variety of Vuser types, each suited to a
particular load testing environment or topology. When you open a new test,
VuGen displays a complete list of the supported protocols.

















While running the Vusers, you gather information about the system’s
response. Afterwards, you can view this information with the Analysis tool.
For example, you can observe how a server behaved when one hundred
Vusers simultaneously withdrew cash from a bank’s ATM.



Developing Vuser Scripts

When testing or monitoring an environment, you need to emulate the true
behavior of users on your system. HP testing tools emulate an environment
in which users concurrently work on, or access your system.
To do this emulation, the human was replaced with a virtual user, or a Vuser.
The actions that a Vuser performs are described in a Vuser script. The primary
tool for creating Vuser scripts is the Virtual User Generator, VuGen.