Performance Center in Loadrunner

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Performance Center has been a useful tool in Loadrunner since the Loadrunner 11.5 version. It was designed with a purpose to run tests without human involvement in order to reduce cost and errors during performance test creation.

In this blog post, we will describe basic operations on Performance Center.

Introducing Performance Center

Performance Center (also known as LoadRunner Enterprise) is a cross-enterprise tool for planning and running multiple performance test projects. It enables you to remotely monitor concurrent tests across different geographic locations.

Note: To improve the customer experience and provide more optimized search, the Performance Center help for versions 12.60-12.63 has been streamlined into a single version. Any version specific changes are indicated where relevant.

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How does Performance Center work?

Discover how Performance Center tests the performance of your applicationsPerformance Center runs scripts that use virtual users, or Vusers, to emulate typical user activity.Vusers generate load on your web servers or applications.While Vusers run, Performance Center collects server response time data.Performance Center analyzes this data which provides a clear picture of performance.
Benefits of using Performance CenterAbility to run multiple tests simultaneously, and share test assets across the project.Web-based, 24×7, globally accessible platform with centralized resource management.DevOps-ready due to its REST APIs, CI plugins, and APM tool integrations (Dynatrace AppMon, New Relic, AppDynamics, CA APM).Dynamic provisioning of elastic load generators using Kubernetes and Swarm.Smart analytics, including anomaly detection while the test is running.Integrates with other Micro Focus software including ALM Octane, Application Lifecycle Management, and Application Performance Monitoring.

What should I do before I begin?

Take the tutorialWe recommend that you follow the steps in the Quick Start Guide to help you create and run a performance test.
Watch Performance Center videosLearn more about how you can incorporate Performance Center into your testing environment by watching Performance Center videos.

How do I get started?

Following are the basic steps for creating and developing a performance test in Performance Center.

1. Create test assetsCreate test assets such as a script, a monitor or a topology to use in your performance test.For details, see Create test assets.
2. Design a testCreate a test by selecting the test assets to use, and defining a workload for the test.For details, see Design a performance test.
3. Reserve a timeslotCreate a timeslot for the test and make sure the timeslot is available.For details, see Reserve timeslots for performance testing.
4. Run the testRun the test to create load on your application and to test its performance. During the test run, you can view and manage test results, Vusers, monitors and load generators.For details, see Manage a performance test run.
5. View and analyze test resultsView test data in real time or offline, and use built-in tools to analyze test results such as trend reports, anomaly detection, and Performance Application Lifecycle (PAL).For details, see View and analyze results.

LoadRunner Enterprise (previously called Performance Center) is an enterprise performance testing tool that allows you to plan and execute tests across multiple test projects in any geographic locations. It is the big brother of LoadRunner Professional that allows you to share the software licence and load generators globally.

Built for performance testing and for engineering specialists working at scale on different projects that need to be tested at the same time, either locally or globally.

LoadRunner Enterprise runs scripts that use virtual users (Vusers) to emulate users generating load on your web servers or applications.

LoadRunner Enterprise collects and analyses end-user and server response time data to provide a clear view of performance.

Benefits of LoadRunner Enterprise (previously called Performance Center)

  • All the benefits of LoadRunner, plus…
  • Share the LoadRunner Enterprise Vusers and load generators with all teams.
  • As many controllers to run the tests as needed, allowing multiple concurrent tests.
  • Schedule tests and the Vusers and load generators you need.
  • Increase efficiency and reduce cost by performance load testing any application.
  • Support a broad range of applications, from legacy tech through to the latest web and mobile applications, with advanced scripting capabilities.
  • Identify bottlenecks via non-intrusive, real-time application performance monitoring (APM) and test diagnostics. Use production monitoring data to compare and fine-tune your tests.
  • Run mobile performance testing for both browser-based and native mobile applications.
  • Use anomaly detection to quickly identify abnormal application behaviour in performance tests.
  • Integrate performance testing into your development environment to achieve continuous integration and continuous testing.

Additional Info

Run JMeter tests from Performance Center

This topic provides an overview of running Apache JMeter tests from Performance Center.

Note: This feature is released as a beta version.

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JMeter tests overview

Apache JMeter is an open source load testing tool for analyzing and measuring the performance of a variety of services, with a focus on web applications. If you work with Apache JMeter tests, Performance Center provides the ability to also run the tests.

By including JMeter (.jmx) scripts in your tests, you can run one or more JMeter tests side-by-side with any other Performance Center tests, giving you a single entry point for executing your performance tests.

Measurements can be viewed online and offline (via Performance Center and Analysis), using the data points from the JMeter tests.

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Set up the JMeter test

This task describes how to upload JMeter scripts to Performance Center and configure runtime settings.

  1. Prerequisites:
    • Download and install JMeter and the latest 64-bit JRE or JDK on all load generator machines on which the script will be run. For JMeter download details, see the Apache documentation. For supported versions of JMeter, see the System Requirements.
    • When installing JMeter, it is recommended to install it on the same path for all the load generators, since you need to enter this path when configuring runtime settings in the Performance Test Designer (see step 3).
    • For existing projects (created in Performance Center versions earlier than 12.55), you need to add support for JMeter script types to the ALM server. For details, see Enable support for JMeter script types (only required for existing projects).
    • Create scripts in JMeter and save the scripts locally. The scripts must be saved in ZIP format and must include all the files in the test scripts folder.Note: To download .csv files, you need to manually copy the .csv files on the load generator running JMeter, and reference the path to their location in the script.
  2. Upload JMeter scripts to Performance Center
    1. From the Performance Center navigation toolbar, click  and select Test Management (under Testing).
    2. Select a destination folder for the scripts, or create a new folder. For details on how to create a folder, see Design a performance test.
    3. Click the Upload Scripts  button.
    4. Select scripts to upload, and upload options. For details, see Upload scripts.Once the JMeter script has been uploaded to Performance Center, you can select the script in the test management tree (identified by the  icon) and see script details in the Preview pane.
  3. Configure JMeter runtime settings
    1. After you have uploaded a JMeter script to Performance Center and added it to a test, select the test in the test management tree and click Edit Test.
    2. In the Groups & Workload view, select a Vuser group and click Edit Runtime Settings . The JMeter Runtime Settings dialog box opens.
    3. Configure the runtime settings:UI ElementsDescriptionJMX MeasurementsSelect to enable JMX measurements during performance test execution.JMeter pathEnter the path to the JMeter script used in step 1, or leave empty to use the default %JMETER_HOME% environment variable.JMeter portSelect the JMeter port to use:
      • Default. Uses the default port (JMeter starts from port 4000 and uses an alternate port if the default port is being used).
      • Range. Enter a range for the JMeter port, or use the default JMeter range (4445 – 4455).
      Remote testingSelect this option to run JMeter in server/node mode.Running JMeter remotely can replicate a test across many low-end computers and thus simulate a larger load on the server.JMeter additional properties fileEnter the local path for the remote load generator that is used as the JMeter Controller for remote JMeter Nodes.Note:
      • This field is enabled only when the Remote testing option is selected.
      • Make sure the additional properties file actually exists in the local path on the remote load generator that is used as the JMeter Controller for remote JMeter Nodes when the test starts.

Note when running a JMeter script:

  • One Vuser will execute all of the JMeter threads defined for each jmx file.
  • We recommend setting test duration to Run Until Completion.

Conclusion

Performance center loadrunner tutorial is the next generation performance testing tool which will help you to verify, tune or troubleshoot your applications by identifying bottlenecks and resource issues.

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