Key performance testing services to bear in mind
Have you ever faced the situation when everyone wants something from you at once? Your mailbox is full, the phone is ringing off the hook, Skype is abuzz with instant messages…
You keep responding and addressing all the issues. However, at some point, you exhale, take a break, and temporarily stop noticing what is happening around you.
The same thing can happen to your application or website. Unfortunately, such breaks can cost you a lot. A user won’t wait until the webpage is loaded, he or she will simply opt for your competitors.
Performance testing will help timely prevent all these possible breakdowns. How? Let’s discuss this in detail.
What is performance testing?
Performance directly affects the functioning of the entire system, ensuring the reliability and ongoing operation of the software even at the moments of the maximum load.
These tests help understand the system behavior in different scenarios. What will happen if the number of users increases from 1,000 to 10,000? Will the loading speed change? Will all the payment methods keep functioning correctly?
The necessary verifications are fulfilled by performance testing engineers who consequently provide the answers to these questions.
There are many types of performance tests that can be conducted on any system.
Let’s identify what services in terms of performance testing are in the highest demand nowadays and what types will be suitable for your business.
What do performance testing engineers verify?
There are six main types of performance verifications: load, volume, stress, stability, scalability, and client-side testing. Depending on the project requirements, these can be applied, mixed up and customized to provide maximum information on the solution performance.
Most often, performance testing engineers are hired to do the following:
- Check the compliance of performance characteristics with the stated requirements. This is especially important for product development companies that modify their solutions for each customer.
- Determine the level of maximum load the software can withstand. Stress testing helps to prepare a product for a successful release with a large-scale advertising campaign.
- Reproduce post-release defects and prepare the release of a product designed for numerous users. The companies constantly increasing the range of proposals through the release of additional products opt for such verifications.
Engineers assess the quality of the client’s system, find bottlenecks, and offer recommendations for their elimination.
QA specialists can also conduct an independent audit of internal or third-party performance testing team, as well as consult or train specialists.
To order a free consultation with a performance testing engineer, click here.
When is performance testing required?
Let us list three cases when you’ll definitely need to involve performance testing engineers into the project.
- You’ve undertaking system migration to a new hardware infrastructure or software platform, for instance, switching from one database to another
What should be done?
In this case, it’s vital to carry out load testing of the entire system, which functions using the old and the new database, and then compare the results.
The QA team monitors how migration affects the system speed (for example, the change of page load time) rather than the overall level of the database performance.
The client receives a comparative summary report with the results of system performance before and after the migration.
- You’ve decided on refactoring, or restructuring the existing code base.
Code changes are often associated with the need to improve performance, optimize queries or code itself, make it easy-to-understand, eliminate duplication, etc.
What should be done?
To evaluate the optimization, it is necessary to perform load testing before and after changing the code. Therefore, the client will see whether the refactoring has led to the desired result of the system optimization.
- The client part of the application has deteriorated after the system release.
What should be done?
Client-side testing is to be performed. The system is checked for a single user, and all verifications are performed on the side of the client.
These procedures can be carried out on any environment, since the system doesn’t undergo the load, and testing doesn’t affect the software performance.
Checking the speed of web application rendering helps identify issues regarding compression, caching, optimizing images, minifying/connecting resources.
It’s often cheaper to increase productivity on the client side. Moreover, if the front-end part of the product is weak, any optimization of the server part will be affected by the slowly operating client part.
Due to an integrated approach, the a1qa engineers analyze all internal system components, prepare detailed results and recommendations for improving product performance.
a1qa performance testing services
- Full-cycle testing by a dedicated team
The team provides full support of the product performance, from requirements gathering to the detailed report preparation on the performance level with a list of bottlenecks and recommendations for fixing them. The service may include various types of testing, chosen individually for each specific product.
If the QA and Dev teams cooperate, the process is improved by reducing the time for fixing defects.
How is the work organized? QA specialists run tests and fulfill the system assessment. If the defects are detected, the QA team passes them to the Dev team for quick fixing. Then the software testing engineers restart test cases, verify the correct system performance, and continue to test the solution.
- Regression testing
New versions of the solutions appear frequently. Every new version can contain changes in the operation of separate system modules or the implementation of new features.
Therefore, the engineers make sure the changes haven’t affected the system performance. The experts use the existing test cases supplemented by additional scenarios to test the modified functionality.
- Configuration of the online monitoring system
The engineers launch a new system that allows real-time monitoring of testing procedures.
Due to the well set up process, the client at any time can receive the access to the information on the testing scope, the number of activities fulfilled, their duration, and all the issues found.
- Database optimization
The a1qa team verifies the speed of database queries, suggests the ways for its optimization, seeks and detects bottlenecks in the database architecture, and checks whether the databases are built correctly.
Order free consultation to determine the appropriate service for your product.
The pros of the a1qa performance testing team
Today, more than 25 engineers work in the a1qa performance testing lab. The user behavior approach, which takes into account the aspects of real users’ activities, forms one of the core advantages of our team. How does it work?
Scenarios for applying the load to the system are closely connected to the actions completed by real users in the system.
The neglect of user behavior may lead to inaccurate test results that cause system failures.
The expertise in big data testing and database profiling allows the engineers to conduct an audit to check whether the speed of queries slows down due to an increase in the number of users, as well as suggest possible ways of optimization.
Summing up
Performance testing is an integral part of the overall solution verification. Defects can lead to system failures, a considerable loss of profit and harm the software reputation on the market.
Timely verifications can ensure smooth software functioning even during the periods of maximum load.
Obviously, performance testing is a very important aspect of launching and running any system, but where do you start from?
The first thing is to determine the optimal performance testing service that needs to be conducted on your product.
Book a free consultation with the a1qa experts to find bottlenecks in the performance of your solution.
