Silk Performer tests

Silk Performer integrates with LoadRunner Enterprise, enabling you to upload and run Silk scripts in LoadRunner Enterprise tests, and view results in the LoadRunner Enterprise graphs.

Silk Integration overview

This integration enables you to save and run Silk scripts in LoadRunner Enterprise tests, and view results in the LoadRunner Enterprise graphs. Silk Performer is a software performance testing tool across web, mobile and enterprise applications.

By including Silk Performer scripts in your LoadRunner Enterprise tests, you can run Silk Performer tests side-by-side with any other tests, giving you a single-entry point for running your performance tests.

Data is reported in real-time, and measurements can be viewed online and offline in LoadRunner Enterprise and Analysis, using the data points from the Silk Performer tests.

Supported versions

  • Silk Performer 21.0.8899 and later

  • LoadRunner Enterprise 2021 and later

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Licensing

Silk Performer interfaces have been mapped with LoadRunner Enterprise license bundles. For example, any Web Vuser license is applicable for a Silk Integration Web Vuser run, or a LoadRunner Web Vuser (they equate to each other).

For example, if you want to run 500 Web Vusers in the Silk Integration, you need 500 LoadRunner Vusers. Web Vusers count for both LoadRunner Enterprise and Silk Performer.

Note:  

  • Silk Performer is not included in the free LoadRunner Enterprise Community license. You will need a license that contains LoadRunner Enterprise Vusers. For details on licensing, see Manage licenses.

  • Licensing works differently in LoadRunner Enterprise for multi-protocol scripts: a license is required for each protocol that is involved. For Silk scripts, it is sufficient to have one license, that covers the highest category protocol (there are three categories: Web, Standard and Premium). For details, see Silk Performer documentation.

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Set up and run a Silk Performer test

This task explains how to set up an run Silk Performer tests in LoadRunner Enterprise.

  1. Prerequisites.

    • Create and edit scripts in Silk Performer Workbench. For details, see the Silk Performer documentation.

    • A Silk Performer Agent must be installed on all load generators used to run Silk Performer scripts (it can be installed using a LoadRunner installer).

      For a silent installation, add the following parameter: INSTALL_SILK_PERFORMER_AGENT=1.

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      SetupOneLG.exe -s -sp"/s INSTALLDIR=""C:\Program Files (x86)\OpenText\LoadRunner OneLG"" IS_RUNAS_SERVICE=1 START_LGA=1 NVINSTALL=N INSTALL_SILK_PERFORMER_AGENT=1"
  2. Upload Silk Performer scripts to LoadRunner Enterprise.

    Note: The configured “Workloads” and Silk “Agents” in the script are not used in the LoadRunner Enterprise-Silk integration. This is because the integration utilizes LoadRunner’s capabilities and agents instead, which must be configured after uploading a script.

    1. In Silk Performer Workbench, edit the scripts according to how you want them to run, except for agents and workloads which will be configured after upload, and save the changes.

    2. Open your project in the Silk Performer Workbench and select File > Upload Project to > LoadRunner Enterprise. Alternatively, click Upload Project and select Upload project to LoadRunner Enterprise in the main flow. The Upload project to LoadRunner Enterprise wizard opens.

      Note: Always use Upload Project to LoadRunner Enterprise instead of using the script files directly, because Silk projects need to be processed with additional data required by LoadRunner Enterprise.

    3. In the Login page of the wizard, enter the following, and then click Next.

      • URL. The LoadRunner Enterprise server URL in the format: http://<LoadRunner Enterprise server name>/loadtest

      • Username. Enter the user name assigned for the LoadRunner Enterprise server.

      • Password. Enter the password assigned for the LoadRunner Enterprise server.

      • Internet Options. Enables you to set internet connections as required.

    4. In the Project page of wizard, select a domain and project to which you want the upload the Silk Performer project (LoadRunner Enterprise lists the domains and projects depending on your access rights), and then click Next.

    5. In the Test Definition page of the wizard, select the folder to which you want to upload the Silk Performer project, and then click Next.

    6. In the User Types page of the wizard, select the user types from your Silk Project that you want to upload to LoadRunner Enterprise (equivalent to a LoadRunner Enterprise script).

      Note: Running Silk Performer projects on LoadRunner Enterprise is performed by splitting the project into user types, each of which represents a script after it has been uploaded to LoadRunner Enterprise.

    7. Click Finish. Silk Performer scripts are uploaded to LoadRunner Enterprise.
  3. In LoadRunner Enterprise, create a test and assign Silk Performer scripts to it. For details, see Design a test.

    In this step you configure LoadRunner type "Workloads" (called Scenarios) using LoadRunner type "Agents" (called Load Generators).

  4. Edit the runtime settings of the script as needed.

    Before you run a performance test, you can view and configure the behavior of the Vuser script in the test using runtime settings. For details, see Configure runtime settings.

  5. Run the test in LoadRunner Enterprise. For details, see Run performance tests.

    Tip: We recommend splitting the load so that no more than 700 Vusers are run on each machine that runs a specific script.

  6. View Silk Performer test results. For details, see Silk Performer graphs.

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Enable additional data collection

You can enable additional data to be collected in several ways, depending on your requirements. This includes enabling measurements at the script level, through the Profile user interface, and creating custom measurements.

Enable measurements at the script level

Raw data reporting in Silk Performer can be enabled at the script level using the MeasureSetOption function. For details, see MeasureSetOption Function and Measurement Functions in the Silk Performer documentation.

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Example:

MeasureSetOption("Search", MEASURE_ALL, MEASURE_OPT_RAWDATA, true);
//Reports measures of all types with the name “Search”.

MeasureSetOption("Search", MEASURE_PAGE_ACTIONTIME, MEASURE_OPT_RAWDATA, true);
//Reports Action Time measures named “Search”

MeasureSetOption("", MEASURE_PAGE_ACTIONTIME, MEASURE_OPT_RAWDATA, true);
//Reports Action Time for all measures

Note: By default in the Silk integration, the following standard measurements are configured to report as raw data even if no MeasureSetOption is set:

  • MEASURE_TRANS

  • MEASURE_TIMER_RESPONSETIME

  • MEASURE_COUNTER

Enable measurements through the Profile user interface

You can enable measurements through the Profile user interface by selecting the measurement groups that you want included in the report.

Data for all items selected in the Measures tab is displayed in LoadRunner Enterprise under Silk Performer graphs.

Enable and create Custom Measurements as LoadRunner Custom Transactions

Using the MeasureStart and MeasureStop functions, you can mark custom measurements in your script that will be processed as typical LoadRunner transactions throughout the script.

For Custom Measurements to be visible, add the following line to your Silk script to enable Raw data for timers:

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MeasureSetOption("", MEASURE_TIMER, MEASURE_OPT_RAWDATA, true);

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Silk Performer measurement mappings

In addition to the data that is displayed in the Silk Performer graphs, Silk Performer scripts produce results that are displayed in the standard Transaction and Web Resource graphs in LoadRunner Enterprise. Only Web and BDLT protocols (Browser Driven Load Test) data graphs are available.

Measurement mappings for the Web – Web HTTP protocol:

Silk Performer Measurements LoadRunner Enterprise Measurements Details
Concurrent connections (successful) Connection N/A
Concurrent connections Connections per second N/A
HTTP 1xx/2xx/3xx/4xx/5xx responses HTTP Responses per Second N/A

Throughput [kb]

  • Response data received [kB]

  • Response data sent [kB]

Throughput (bytes) N/A
Hits Hits per Second This includes http codes, hits (passed), and hits (failed) "Total Hits" in LoadRunner Enterprise includes HTTP status return codes as well.

BDLT (Browser Driven Load Test) data point mappings:

Silk Performer Data Points LoadRunner Enterprise Data Points
Browser Driven -> Action Time Page Load Event duration
DOM Complete Page DOMContentLoaded Event duration
DOM Interactive DOM Interactive

Other raw measurement data:

Any other measurements enabled in the Silk project (in the script or Vuser profiles) appears in the Silk Performer graphs and can be added to the report as needed.

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Known issues for Silk Performer scripts

The following known issues apply to Silk Performer scripts:

Product Known Issue
LoadRunner Enterprise
  • Silk scripts can be run on load generators on Windows platforms only (Silk is not available on Linux).

  • Runtime settings support logging options only. All other Silk script changes must be made in Silk Workbench.

  • Silk scripts must be run in agent process mode. Silk has not been tested to work in service mode.

  • NV (Network Virtualization) is not supported.

  • Goal-oriented scenarios are not supported.

  • Adding extra Vusers during runtime is not supported because Silk Performer allocates a fixed number of Vusers at the start.

Silk Performer
  • Silk type Workloads are not configurable (LoadRunner Enterprise utilizes Silk Performer’s Dynamic workload model for this integration, which is controlled by LoadRunner).

  • Silk type Agents are not used (only LoadRunner Enterprise load generators are used). LoadRunner Enterprise load generators now come bundled with Silk Performer Agent enabling you to run Silk Performer scripts through the Silk Performer SDK.

  • Running BDLT tests as a service runs the browsers in a separate Windows session and they are not visible. To see the browsers, use an interactive RDP session for the LoadRunner Enterprise load generator. For details, see Run Vusers in an interactive RDP session.

  • Synchronization functions, such as rendezvous points or global variables, are not supported.

  • Global functions such as GetUserID do not return a global ID, because each Silk project is run in a sandbox by LoadRunner Enterprise.

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