Basics of LoadRunner

Today I am going to share some basics about the Performance Testing Tool i.e. LoadRunner. This tool is having 77% market share in the Load Testing market worldwide. This shows the need for a Performance Tester to know about this beautiful tool. So here we go....

About LoadRunner

1. It is a complete solution for conducting automated load testing for an application.
2. It is an industry standard tool for doing Performance testing
3. The tool supports a wide variety of protocols to do Performance Testing
4. This is a license based tool by HP-Mercury
5. The Latest Version released is 9.5

LoadRunner Components


The following are the different components of LoadRunner.

1. Vugen
2. Controller
3. LoadGenerator
4. Analysis

Lets have a brief description about each of these components

1. LoadRunner - Vugen

The Vugen or Virtual User Generator is the component of LoadRunner used to create the scripts.Using Vugen, we can create the scripts needed for the specific protocol and by recording the user
steps in the application under test. Loadrunner automatically converts the user steps into scripts.The scripts are then modified to make them dynamic. The following are some of the features of
Vugen Scripts

1. The Vugen scripts issue non-GUI API calls using the same protocols as the client under test
2. Supports various protocols like Web, Winsock, Oracle, ODBC, etc…
3. Records using both IE and NS browser and has an in-built browser for play back
4. Supports different recording modes
5. Supports SSL based applications

2. LoadRunner - Controller

The Controller is main part of Loadrunner. In Loadrunner, the licenses are bought in terms of the Number of Vusers that can be run, and the protocol for which they can run. This license

information is used by controller when we schedule a run. During a test execution, a controller performs a lot of tasks like LoadGenerator connection, Assigning scripts and users to

LoadGenerators, Collecting metrics, etc… The various features of a controller is given below

1. Used to define scenarios to performs different test executions and to manage and maintain the scenarios
2. Enables to control all the Vusers from a single workstation for a given scenario
3. While executing a scenario, the Load Runner Controller distributes each Vuser to a Load Generator
4. During a run, we can monitor the status of the different servers to collect data on their health

3. LoadRunner - LoadGenerator


A LoadGenerator is a machine that generates the specified load on the Application under Test. The machine has the LoadGenerator software installed and must have connection to the Controller
and the AUT. During the run, it collects the metrics and submits them to the controller at the end of the run. The following are the features of LoadGenerators.

1. Runs as a Process or as a Thread
2. Enables the Vuser to emulate the actions of a human user in the background
3. Simulates load due to thousands of Vusers shared across many machines
4. During run-time, threaded vusers share a common memory pool
5. Threading supports more Vusers per load generator

4. LoadRunner - Analysis

The Analysis component of Loadrunner is used for analyzing the results of a run. The tool can be launched from the Controller or can be launched individually. The Analysis reads the collated data
from the run and prepares the Analysis report which is a series of graphs depicting how a run has progressed. Using the analysis graphs, we can conclude whether the test has gone successfully or
not. The following are some of the features of Analysis

1. Provides the user with a series of graphs to analyze results
2. Allows the user to merge 2 graphs to compare results
3. Provides the user to create a template based on which the default graphs appears
4. Provides the user to prepare a Html report or Word report as needed.

Hope this helps for my reader as a starting point of LoadRunner.