Oracle Application Testing

Before you release your web applications and Oracle packaged applications into a live environment, you need to get a sense of how well they will perform when they are being accessed simultaneously by many users. The best way to get a good sense of how they will perform under these kinds of stresses is by performing a load test on them.

Executing a good load test will allow you to launch your applications with confidence. However, it is important to do the load test right. Many companies and organizations who load test their applications find it to be very frustrating process. If you follow these five guidelines, you will find that load testing is not at all a frustrating process and is, in fact, a positive experience.

1. You should load test from the end-user’s point of view

You will get the best results from your load testing if you test from the end-user’s point of view. A good load tester that allows you to test from the end user’s point of view will simulate the actual user experience. You will be able to get data on which levels of stress the application can cope with and which levels of stress the application cannot cope with. Ultimately, you can use this information to make adjustments to your application before going live.

2. The time and cost of load tests can easily spiral out of control

The biggest reason why load testing has a negative reputation is because it is seen as being expensive both in time and money. Some load tests can take months to execute if traditional load testers are used. This results in a substantial delay in which the people who rely on these applications cannot actually use them.

Load testing using traditional load testers can also be quite expensive if you add up the cost of the load tester with the high set up, licensing and consulting fees. To avoid this, you need to select a load tester that is efficient in its set up and execution.

3. You should perform multiple load tests

It is certainly important to load test for the amount of expected usage on your Oracle application. At the same time, it is also important to run load tests on higher than expected loads as well. You can never fully know what your application will be expected to do when it goes live, so running these different load tests is a way of launching your application with more confidence.

It is important, therefore, to select a load tester which can easily be adjusted to run load tests with different loads, including these higher than expected loads.

4. Planning can help make your load tests run more smoothly

Good planning is an important component of a successful load test. Thinking through the exact performance issues that you will be testing for, estimating the kinds of loads that your application will face when it goes live and determining what a successful load test will look like are all important things to do before beginning the test.

Good planning like this will save you time and money.

5. A good load test will give you the kind of data that allows you to make any necessary adjustments to your Oracle applications

Ultimately, the time and energy that you spend load testing will mean very little if you do not get data that you can actually use. Many load testers on the market today do not give very good data.

The first thing the look for in a load tester if you want good data is to see if it tests from the end user’s point of view. You should then look at the way that the load tester compiles and presents that information. Ideally it should be presented in a way that allows you to quickly identify when the application was performing sub-optimally. This will allow you to go and make changes to your application.

As you can tell, the load tester that you select is critical since you will ultimately determine whether or not these five important things can be implemented in your load tests. Most load testers on the market today do not adequately incorporate these five things.

One load tester on the market today which does is AppLoader. AppLoader is a protocol independent load tester, which means that it load tests for all types of applications, including Oracle applications. It performs these load tests from the end user’s point of view and gives quality, easy to interpret data.

AppLoader is cost-effective, efficient and effective. Unlike other load testers, it is easy to set up and execute load tests. Load tests with AppLoader are fast, which means that you can get your application up and running with confidence quickly. For these reasons, it is the best load tester on the market for all types of organizations and businesses running Oracle applications.