SilkPerformer by Borland Software (Segue) is a powerful, yet easy to use, enterprise-class load and stress testing tool. Visual script generation techniques and the ability to test multiple application environments with thousands of concurrent users allow you to thoroughly test your enterprise applications' reliability, performance, and scalability before they are deployed - regardless of their size and complexity. Powerful root cause analysis tools and management reports help you isolate problems and make quick decisions - thereby minimizing test cycles and accelerating your time to market:

Ensure the scalability, performance, and reliability of your enterprise applications

SilkPerformer ensures the quality of your enterprise applications by measuring their performance from the end-user perspective, as well as internally, in a variety of scenarios under dynamic load conditions. Using its innovative TrueScale™ technology, SilkPerformer can simulate thousands of concurrent users with a single computer, providing you with the power required for visual content verification while consuming a minimum of hardware resources. When required, load test agents located at remote test centers can be utilized without compromising firewall integrity. Within a single load test, virtual users working with different Web, middleware, and database protocols - in addition to varied computing environments - can be simulated.

Client IP address simulation allows for the testing of load-balanced sites. Support for the latest Internet security standards also enables SilkPerformer to test all aspects of your mission critical enterprise application. SilkPerformer’s Benchmark Description Language (BDL) is specifically designed for testing purposes and provides an easy and powerful means of controlling user activity.

Web pages are accurately requested by emulating the connection behavior, cookie management, and caching strategies of real browsers. Meanwhile TrueModem™ technology and realistic workload models complement SilkPerformer’s unmatched accuracy. Finally, verification under load ensures that functional errors such as incorrect Web page content are detected reliably—under all load conditions. Plus, industry-standard interfaces for extensibility ensure that SilkPerformer can be used in scenarios for which out-of-the-box functionality is not sufficient.

Test remote components early in the development cycle

Dramatically reduce the cost of bugs in your multi-tier enterprise application by testing the functionality, interoperability, and performance of remote components under concurrent access early in the development cycle—even before client applications have been built. You can rapidly generate test drivers for Web services, .NET remoting objects, EJB’s and Java RMI objects by exploring them via a point & click interface. Alternately, you can reuse unit test drivers written by developers for concurrency tests or you can build new test cases directly in Java and other .NET languages, such as C# and VB.NET, using SilkPerformer’s Java Editor and Visual Studio .NET Add-In

Create test scenarios quickly and shorten test cycles

• Use SilkPerformer’s Integrated Test Environment as your single point of control
  
• Set up and configure large load test environments, including multiple agent computers, in minutes—all from a single location
  
• Discover SilkPerformer’s ease-of-use with its built-in methodology based step-by-step workflow wizards
  
• Automatically generate scripts that include content verifications and JavaScript handling—virtually eliminating the need for manual scripting
  
• Easily customize tests with random user-data without programming a single line of code
  
• Re-use test cases in different environments and scenarios without changing test scripts
  
• Quickly create realistic workloads by using SilkPerformer’s integrated workload wizard
  
• Automatically balance loads across all agent machines driving load tests
  
• View your load test health in real time - thereby avoiding invalid test results that require rework
  
  

Pinpoint problems easily for quick resolution

SilkPerformer’s unrivaled TrueLog™ technology for HTML, XML, SQL, TCP/IP, and UDP based protocol data provides full visual root-cause analysis from the end-user perspective. TrueLogs visually recreate the data that users provide and receive during load tests—for HTML pages this includes all embedded objects—enabling you to visually analyze the behavior of your application as errors occur during load tests. Plus, detailed response timer statistics help you uncover the root causes of missed service levels before your application goes live.

With the addition of the Server Analysis Module™, you can monitor server statistics and correlate data with load test results to identify ongoing problems with your system’s back-end servers—even when servers are located behind firewalls.

Ultimately, SilkPerformer’s Web-based management reports are easy to share, customize, and understand which enables non-technical decision makers to quickly interpret test results—thereby saving time.

Supported protocols and interfaces for load testing:

LHTTP(S)/HTML, SOAP (XML), WAP2 (WTLS, MMS), i-Mode, streaming media (MS, Real), FTP, LDAP, SMTP, POP, SSL, CORBA (IIOP), EJB (IIOP, Java RMI), .NET remoting, (D)COM, ActiveX, ODBC, Oracle Call Interface (OCI), DB2 CLI, DLL’s, Java (Framework), .NET (Framework), VB (Framework), TCP/IP, UDP, Tuxedo ATMI, Jolt, and Jacada.

Supported CRM/ERP systems:

PeopleSoft 7/8, Siebel 6/7, mySAP Workplace, Chordiant 3/5, e.Piphany, SSPS ShowCase, Amdocs Clarify, and Lawson.

Data Wizard for Data-Driven Testing

LoadRunner's Data Wizard enables you to quickly create data-driven tests and eliminate manual data manipulation. It connects directly to back-end database servers and imports desired data into test scripts.

Real-time monitors:

Windows and Unix system/network counters, SNMP, server counters for Microsoft IIS, Apache, IBM WebSphere, BEA WebLogic, Oracle, IBM DB2, SQL Server, and others.

System requirements:

• Software: Microsoft Windows 2003/XP, 2000, or NT 4.0
  
• Hardware: Single/multi-processor system with Pentium II (or higher) equivalent CPU, 256 MB RAM for controller computer, 320-570 KB RAM per virtual Web user on agent computer, 150 MB disk space