Introducing Controller

Welcome to LoadRunner Controller.

Controller is a tool for creating and controlling LoadRunner Professional scenarios. A scenario defines the events that occur during each testing session. It controls the number of users to emulate, the actions they perform, and the machines on which they run their emulations. You use scenarios to create load tests to check the reliability and strength of your servers.

Controller terminology

The following terminology is commonly used in Controller:

Scenario	A scenario is a sequence of events that emulate the hypothetical actions of real users on your application.
Vusers	In the scenario, LoadRunner Professional replaces real users with virtual users or Vusers. While a workstation accommodates only a single human user, many Vusers can run concurrently on a single workstation. In fact, a scenario can contain tens, hundreds, or even thousands of Vusers.
Vuser scripts	The actions that a Vuser performs during the scenario are described in a Vuser script. When you run a scenario, each Vuser executes a Vuser script. The Vuser scripts include functions that measure and record the performance of your application's components.
Transactions	To measure the performance of the server, you define transactions. A transaction represents an action or a set of actions that you are interested in measuring. You define transactions within your Vuser script by enclosing the appropriate sections of the script with start and end transaction statements. For example, you can define a transaction that measures the time it takes for the server to process a request to view the balance of an account and for the information to be displayed at the ATM.
Rendezvous points	You insert rendezvous points into Vuser scripts to emulate heavy user load on the server. Rendezvous points instruct Vusers to wait during test execution for multiple Vusers to arrive at a certain point, so that they may simultaneously perform a task. For example, to emulate peak load on the bank server, you can insert a rendezvous point instructing 100 Vusers to deposit cash into their accounts at the same time.
Load generator	When you execute a scenario, Controller distributes each Vuser in the scenario to a load generator. The load generator is the machine that executes the Vuser script, enabling the Vuser to emulate the actions of a human user.
Performance analysis	Vuser scripts include functions that measure and record system performance during load-testing sessions. During a scenario run, you can monitor the network and server resources. Following a scenario run, you can view performance analysis data in reports and graphs.

Primary items in scenario

The following are the primary items that you define in your scenario:

Scenario type. A goal-oriented or manual scenario.
Tests. The scripts or unit tests to run.
Machines. The machines upon which to run the tests.
Vusers. The number of virtual users (Vusers) to run on each machine.
Scheduling. How to load the Vusers.
Monitors. Which measurements to monitor during the test run.

Scenario type

When you open Controller for the first time, it prompts you to select a type of scenario: goal-oriented or manual.

Goal-oriented scenario. Define the goals you want your test to achieve. LoadRunner Professional automatically builds a scenario for you based on these goals.

For example you can define a goal for a specific number of Vusers to run simultaneously. Alternatively, you can define a goal to test your server performance such as Pages per Minute, Hits per Second, or Transactions per Second. For details, see Goals types for goal-oriented scenarios.
Manual scenario. Add Vusers and select scripts/unit tests manually. You then distribute them on the available machines. For details, see Manual scenarios.

Scripts and test types

During a scenario run, Controller runs Vuser scripts or system/unit tests.

Vuser scripts are test scripts created with Virtual User Generator (VuGen).

In addition, LoadRunner Professional includes add-ins that allow you to integrate the LoadRunner API with external development environments, such as Microsoft Visual Studio, Eclipse, and IntelliJ IDEA, and to run tests from the native environment.

System/unit tests refer to Selenium tests, or NUnit and JUnit tests, that are created in external development environments such as Microsoft Visual Studio or Eclipse. You can work in your native environment and prepare unit tests in binary form, such as .dll or .jar files, and then run them from Controller.

For details on available add-ins, see Additional components and applications.

The Controller's opening dialog box prompts you to select the scripts and/or system/unit tests to include in the scenario. For details, see New Scenario dialog box.

All of your selections, along with the test paths, are saved in a scenario file (.lrs). You define all of the other aspects of your scenario in Controller's Design tab. For details, see Design tab.

Licenses

You can view your current license or add new ones, using the License Utility. For details, see Manage and install licenses.

Port usage

To enable internal communications between Controller and other components, make sure that port 5976 is kept open on the Controller machine.