Post-2.0 updates and plans for 2012

We released Load Impact 2.0 at the end of October, and the reception has been really, really good. We see an increased number of user registrations and more user activity and what is especially fun is to see that people are starting to use Load Impact for really complex load testing of a wide range of different platforms and applications. It seems all the new functionality of Load Impact 2.0 has been very well received and that people are starting to realize its potential, which is great to see for us who have worked so hard in 2011 on getting it out the door.

Right after release we had a number of issues with the payment system, as well as numerous small bugs that only manifested themselves in production, but overall it was a successful release without any major malfunctions. There are still small annoyances left to iron out, but we are making the service better by the day, and also adding new functionality. Here is a list of some things we have done post-release:

• Support for new load zone in south america - Sao Paolo, Brazil - and new US West load zone - Portland, Oregon.
• New chart/graph component implemented, providing even more advanced graphing capabilities (e.g. instant zoom)
• Improved help/documentation - customer case studies, load scripting tutorial and example scripts
• Data export functionality added (export to CSV)
• Several problems related to the payment system have been fixed. AMEX support was added.
• Several problems related to test startup have been fixed.
• Credit refund logic for aborted or failed tests has been improved. You now get partial or full refunds when a test fails, for some reason.
• Anonymous tests are run from random load zones.
• Numerous small UI bugfixes/improvements.
• HTTP basic Auth now supported for automatic load script generation.

Load Impact 2.0 was released at the end of October (27th). The first few days after release were pretty chaotic, with lots of minor issues and some major ones, but having been involved in many big releases during my career I have to say that this one went pretty well actually. The system was up and functional most of the time, the first few days post-release, and that isn't bad at all :-)

Still, there were some difficulties, of course. We had problems first with AMEX payments due to contractual reasons (AMEX payments have been removed for now, until we manage to get through the AMEX bureaucracy) and then with VISA/MC payments. Then there was occasional problems with internal queueing systems that caused some load tests to either fail, "freeze" (get stuck in some state), or never get started. All these issues should have been resolved by now, but there are likely smaller things that will pop up from time to time, so we urge everyone to get in touch with us if you see anything strange happening on the site. Don't hesitate to get in touch with us even if you're unsure whether something is a problem on our side or not, we want to know about all situations where someone has any kind of problem using our service. No issue is too small.

In general, the system is starting to get very stable now, however, and we see more activity than before the release, with more user registrations and more tests being executed. We also see more advanced usage of our service - more people are writing advanced load scripts and running both larger and more complex load tests than ever before. It is all very encouraging and tells us that we are moving in the right direction!

So what is so great about 2.0 then?

Some people may see Load Impact 2.0 as simply an upgrade, but it's more like the launch of a whole new service. It is that much different from 1.0. We have kept some 1.0 key elements that we (and hopefully everyone else) liked such as the ability to run small, simple tests anonymously from our front page, the ability to watch other such anonymous tests that are being run, and the scripting language and scripting API, but behind the scenes most of the code base is new and 2.0 includes a lot of new functionality that didn't exist in 1.0. Here is a small list:

• Large-scale load tests
  As we are now using public cloud infrastructure (Amazon) to generate load test traffic, we have the ability to scale up a load test to a very large size at any of the geographic locations where there are cloud servers available (currently California, Oregon and Virginia in the US, plus Ireland, Japan and Singapore outside the US).
  
  
  
• Multiple user scenarios in a single test
  In 2.0 we introduce "user scenarios". A user scenario defines a certain simulated user category and what that category should be doing on your site. An example can be an e-shopping site that has two types of visitors - one type that just browses the site without buying anything, and another type that registers a user account on the site and then goes on to actually buy products on the site. In Load Impact 1.0 you could not easily combine these two different user categories in a single load test, but with Load Impact 2.0 it is easy - you just create two different user scenarios, that run different load scripts, then you configure your load test to use these two scenarios.
  
  
• Multiple geographical traffic sources
  With Load Impact 2.0 you can now choose to have your traffic originate from more than one physical place, if you want. You can specify any number of combinations of user scenarios (described above) and geographical locations where that particular user scenario should be executed, and create very complex load test configurations where you define that e.g. 10% of the total number of simulated users during the load test should run user scenario X from geographical location Y.
  
  
• More performance metrics
  We now collect more performance metrics than in 1.0, such as "requests per second", and we collect many more sampling points that are all time-based rather than client level-based. This results in more performance data available at higher resolutions than before.
  
  
  
• Much more advanced chart/graph capabilities
  We provide a very dynamic test report page where you can create your own charts and graphs, plotting a wide range of parameters and correlate data with a certain user scenario or test results from a certain geographical region.
  
  
  
• Text-based script editor
  
  For expert users, a text-based scripting editor is usually the best choice, and in Load Impact 2.0 we provide the option to choose between our graphical script editor (LILE) and a text editor that allows easy copy-and-paste and faster code entry for the experienced programmer. Load script programmers now have much more choice in how they create their load scripts.
  
  
• Continuous tests
  Load tests are now executed continuously, which means that a simulated client thread is never shut down as long as the load level is meant to increase. Old simulated clients will just continue execution, reiterating their load script again and again, while more clients are being added. The result is a smoother and more time-efficient ramp-up process than was offered in Load Impact 1.0.
  
  
• Credit based pricing model
  Load Impact 2.0 introuces the credit based model that means there is no difference between one user and the next as regarding them being a "premium" user or not. All users are the same, they just have different amounts of credits, and the ones that have more credits can run larger and longer tests than those who have few credits. This provides several advantages - first of all it allows us to skip all the old limits on how many tests you can run per 24 hours, etc. Now, every test you run consumes credits and only the number of credits you have affects the number of tests you can run. Secondly it means we don't have to restrict access to some functionality to premium users - everyone can do everything on the system, so it is easy to "try before you buy". Thirdly, it makes our product much simpler in general as we only sell one single thing now - Credits - while as earlier we sold access to different premium levels for different amounts of time, making everything a lot more complex. The drawback, however, is that it can be difficult for people to understand exactly how many credits they need to do the testing they want to do. All in all, though, we think the upsides with the credit model are much bigger than the downsides.

We're excited to announce Load Impact 2.0 !

Early spring 2011, we were sitting on a ton of ideas about how to improve Load Impact. We had lots of things on our TODO list for the next few major releases of the service, and were discussing what to focus on first and what our general development road map should look like for the rest of 2011.

We came to the conclusion that incremental updates, that we had been doing so far, was not the best course of action. Some of the changes we wanted to make to the service were dependent on other changes we also wanted to make, and some were hard to achieve on top of the current legacy system. Some parts of old Load Impact we had long been wanting to remake from the ground up, and we realized that this was the time to do it. To break with the old codebase and start a new one, transferring everything we liked from the old code base but not hesitating to throw out anything we did not like.

So we embarked on that long and hard, but also fun, journey. Initially, we aimed to continue updating the old platform regularly, rolling out new features and updates to the live site while developing Load Impact 2.0 in parallel. We soon realized that this was overly ambitious, however, and decided that advanced scripting and the menu-based scripting editor that we released in April would be the last major update to the old Load Impact code base.

Then we spent most of the summer and autumn frantically developing Load Impact 2.0. Since August we have been in crunch mode, working 10-hour days, 6 days a week (which is quite a lot to us lazy and decadent Europeans) and our efforts are starting to pay off now, with the 2.0 platform getting closer and closer to being release ready. At the time of writing we are running a closed beta test, and we expect that to continue for another week or two, then we will take 1-2 weeks to finish off everything, and finally release in the second half of October.

So, what's in it for me?  How will Load Impact 2.0 affect me?

First of all, Load Impact 2.0 is a huge upgrade from the old system. We don't want to spoil the surprise, but it will mean a big step up functionality-wise. We expect our competitors to tear their hair out when they see it, at the very least. Introducing a lot of new features often means that you also introduce complexity, but we think we have made a pretty good job of hiding complex functionality until the user asks for it. Load Impact 2.0 should be as easy to use as (or easier than) the current system.

Introducing Load Impact credits

One big change that we want to announce beforehand, however, is the new pricing model we will adopt in 2.0. So far, we have been selling subscriptions to premium users, letting them buy premium access for a certain amount of time (a day, a week or a month) but we have realized there are several drawbacks to this scheme. For example, people cannot try out all the Load Impact features until they buy a premium subscription. How do they know that they will be able to do what they want to do, if they can't try before they buy? Also, we have to have limits in place on how many tests you can run, how much data you can transfer etc during your subscription period, otherwise we could be hard hit if someone bought e.g. premium access for a month and then ran one test after another, continuously throughout the whole month. So we set limits, and when a user runs one test too many they are told they can't run any more tests. Many people miss these limits, and are upset when they suddenly get denied trying to start a test.

To avoid these problems, and to get a simpler premium product, we have decided to scrap the old time-based subscriptions and instead sell Load Impact Credits. The credits are used whenever you run a load test, with a small test costing less than a large test. Just by having a registered account you will automatically receive a small amount of credits for free every month. You can use these credits to run several smaller load tests, or perhaps one medium-sized test. Per month. If your needs are more frequent or you need to run larger tests, you have to buy extra credits.

We think this system is fair and that it will allow all our amateur load testing users to continue running really small-scale load tests for free, with access to all our functionality, while the professional testers will have to pay for their testing as they often need to run more large-scale tests and sometimes more frequently also.

What will happen with the old system?  Will I be able to access my old test results?

When Load Impact 2.0 is released, we will transfer all users from the old system to the new. We will then also migrate all old test results, configurations etc. The new system will be backwards compatible with the old so you will not lose any data. In fact, there are some test result metrics that we collect today, but which you are not able to see in the user interface (such as how many transactions returned error codes). These metrics will be available in 2.0, even for your old test results.

As Load Impact 2.0 will contain all the functionality (and more) of the current system, we have no plans on keeping the old system running in parallel with the new. When we release, you will not be able to logon to the old system anymore. The web address will still be the same as always - http://loadimpact.com - but the look-and-feel, and the functionality will be different.

What if I have an active subscription at the time you upgrade the site - what happens to my subscription?

Existing subscribers will be given a generous supply of credits, so they will not feel they lost anything by buying a premium account just before the upgrade.

When is the exact date of the release?

We have to get back to you on that!  When the exact date is set, we will email all our users about it.

If you have any more thoughts or questions, don't hesitate to contact us

Our proxy recorder now seamlessly records pages that use the SSL protocol.

One of the most popular tools is the session recorder, which allows you to record a series of actions on your websites and turn it into a loadscipt. No coding is needed whatsoever! However, one issue was that it does not support SSL. In other words, if a login page used the SSL protocol, the user will have to temporarily removed the protocol, perform recording, enable the protocol, change all http to https in the loadscript and then run the test. Well, that's all in the past now! 

We have improved our session recorder such that it enables all recordings on websites that use SSL. Hence, no more tedious updating of the loadscript after recording. You simply record the script which includes entering your login details and once you click "stop recording" the script is generated with the correct URLs.

Below is a test of my.pogoplug.com. As you can see, the script has all the Urls with https at where they should be.

We hope you will give the updated proxy recorder a try and feel free to share your opinion with us!

/Jack

New advanced scripting and menu-based editor!

Load Impact is proud to announce advanced scripting and a new Logic
Editor (the Load Impact Logic Editor, or LILE in short). LILE will replace the current
load script viewer/editor, and together with the advanced scripting features, it will provide our users more
flexibility in creating more dynamic load scripts. One example scenario
that the user will be able to load test now would be the keying in of
different data on an online form. In the past, all simulated users fill
the form using the same data but now a more realistic scenario can be modeled. 

Another advantage of the new editor is that it operates on a
structured platform with many preset menus and variables. This allows
easy scripting of complex operations. Moreover, there are over several common
use cases to choose from which the tester can customise for their
own needs.

The old editor:

The new editor:

Note that "Analyze page" button remains the same. Clicking it will still generate the load script based on the URL in Target webpage. Also, checking "Only get objects from target page" still generate URLs in the load script that has the same domain.


Let's go through a brief orientation of LILE

Let's take a look at some example cases that you can create:

1) Multiple user login