Prerequisites

Successfully performing load testing has several prerequisites beyond that of other forms of testing:

• A dedicated test environment: Taking the system to its limits may cause other tests to fail, so they should be run elsewhere.
• A complete test environment: To see realistic loading issues, you will need a complete, realistic system with the correct subsystems and resources in place.
• A reliable test environment: You need networks without packet loss and systems without other recurring issues before you can reliably find loading issues.
• A loaded test environment: Add at least as many entities as are present on your live system.
• Load generation tools: To rapidly create entities and perform actions on your system:
  • This includes generating web requests or a database load, simulating client connections, or data processing tasks. For more details, see the Load test design section.

All these need to be in place to carry out the tests in this section...