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Load Testing Blog

  • in JMeter
  • 11 min read

From Performance Tests to Sanity Tests with JMeter

In this blog post we are going to look at how we can use our performance tests to act as Sanity Test. We have touched upon the subject in one of our blog posts on the hidden benefits or performance testing.

This post will however look to provide more detail on the subject and provide guidance on how you can accomplish this.

Aim of this post

We are not suggesting that you write a set of JMeter tests to act as sanity tests for our application under test as that would not be that beneficial. There are much better ways to write sanity tests for applications in the form of Unit Tests in code or by using a functional testing tool such as Playwright.

What we are going to investigate is how you could use already existing JMeter tests to also support Sanity testing. If you have a set of performance tests or are in the process of creating a set of performance tests for a particular project or programme, then to build them in such a way that they can double as Sanity tests would be beneficial.

We will look at how when building a test, you could also add some additional logic to give your performance tests the capability of supporting an application Sanity test. If you have a set of tests already that you have built, then by following this post will show you how these existing assets can be updated to support Sanity testing.

All tests will be written in JMeter.

Defining and Maintaining Performance Test Coverage

In this post we are going to look at performance test coverage. What functionality to performance test can range from very little to most of the application under test and both are valid under the right circumstances. We have talked about what to performance test in other posts available in the OctoPerf Blog but as part of a wider post about performance testing rather than as the subject of the post. This is an important topic and deserves a post devoted to it.

We are going to discuss the performance coverage topic through a series of questions which we will explore in detail. These questions are:

  • in JMeter
  • 9 min read

Postman Collection to JMeter

In this blog post we are going to look at how we take a postman request or collection and translate these into JMeter tests. When web services are being build it is common for Postman to be used to test the endpoints. This is done by:

  • Development teams
  • Wider Quality Assurance community
  • Business users
  • Product owners

the list goes on.

What naturally happens during programmes where web services are part of the design is that postman requests and collections are built and grow to support all manner of requirements. Using these collections to quickly build your performance tests can save you a significant amount of time and effort when it comes to understanding the web service you are testing along with the payload that the web service expects.

You will find that in some cases you can inherit a fully functioning set of web service requests that support all your requirements from a performance testing perspective.

Build your own JMeter Docker Image and execute your Performance Test

If you'd like to run load tests in a simple way, and possibly share them, while benefiting from a simplified configuration, with a focus on writing your test plan, and its test typology, this article is for you!

Docker offers virtualization services that simplify the replication of working environments.

Furthermore, each virtualized service is isolated from unrelated services on other containers or the host machine, ensuring portability across host machines and the network.

Using JMeter within a Docker container offers several advantages :

Portability :

Docker enables the creation of lightweight and portable containers that can run on any Docker-compatible system, whether it's Linux, macOS, or Windows. This simplifies the deployment and management of JMeter, avoiding compatibility issues related to different system configurations.

Isolation :

Docker containers provide an isolated environment for running applications, meaning JMeter's dependencies and runtime environment are encapsulated within the container. This reduces potential conflicts with other applications or system components.

Ease of deployment :

With Docker, distributing and deploying JMeter across multiple machines or environments is straightforward.

You can create a Docker image containing JMeter and distribute it to your team or various test environments, streamlining the deployment process.

Version management :

By using Docker, you can version your Docker images containing JMeter, facilitating the management of different versions of JMeter used in your tests. You can also share these images via public or private Docker registries

JMeter JMesPath Extractor

Extracting values from server responses is a common operation in scripting scenarios for performance testing. In most cases it is a mandatory step in order to reproduce realistic traffic using dynamic values generated on server side like sessionIds or Tokens.

The most known way to extract values is using regular expression. While regular expressions are efficient for raw text-based responses, they are less efficient for structured responses like XML or JSON. JMeter provides specific extractors for those kind of responses. For JSON structures, JMeter implements 2 ways for handling them: