Performance Testing Checklist | David Tzemach

Performance tests are performed to determine the response time of a system under a specific workload, these type of tests will help us improve the user experience while working with the software.  

For more Information about performance testing, you can read my previous articles:

David Tzemach Blog: Types of Performance Tests | David Tzemach

David Tzemach Blog: What Is Performance Testing | David Tzemach

My checklist for performance testing 

The preliminary questions

·         Do you need to compare the performance results against your competitors?

·         What is the time frame that you have to execute the process?

·         How do you intend to execute the tests in real world?

·         What is the purpose of doing performance testing?

·         What are the performance test objectives?

·         What type of failures do you anticipate?

·         How flexible the timelines are?

Test Analysis prior to starting the project

·         What do you need to measure during the testing process (Response Time, Volume, memory etc.)?

·         What types of performance tests do you need to perform (Volume, Spike, Load, etc.)?

·         All functional tests of the application are done prior to the performance tests?

·         What do you need to cover during the testing process?

·         What are the Entry criteria to start the tests?

·         What are the interfaces of the application?

·         What is the pass/fail criteria that we use to evaluate the test results (Response time, memory consumption, I/o etc.)?

Team

·         What are the areas of responsibilities (Developers, Testers, Managers etc.)?

·         Do you have the relevant people to perform the process?

·         Do you need to add training to your team?

The available resources

·         Do you need to integrate with external support teams that will consume the budget?

·         How do you intend to create the testing data (Auto tool or Manually)?

·         Do you have a permanent / temporary resources?

·         What budget is available to perform the process?

Reporting

·         Do you need to use a 3^rd party tool to generate the reports?

·         Who will be responsible to report the testing process?

·         What data should be included in the report?

·         How the report is conducted?

·         What are the timelines that the report should be delivered (Monthly, Weekly, Daily)?

Performance testing consideration

Test Environment

·         Do you have the resources to create the performance test environment as similar to real production?

·         What is the testing environment that we need to use to execute the tests?

·         How much time do you need to invest to create the test environment?

·         Are secondary servers being available in any case of server failure?

·         Who will be responsible to create and maintain the environment?

·         Do you intend to run on virtual architecture (VMware/Hyper-V)?

·         Do you have the knowledge to build a virtual environment?

·         Do you need to buy new hardware to support the tests?

Test Data  

·         What amount of data do we need to create as to support the testing scenarios?

·         How do you intend to create the testing data (Auto tool or Manually)?

·         Do you have enough storage to handle the testing data?

·         Can you replicate the data to reduce the creation time?

·         Can you use the test data in future projects?

·         What is the effort to create the testing data?

·         Does the testing data should be unique?

·         Where do you intend to store the data?

Testing Baseline

·         Who is responsible to provide the current performance baseline?

·         What is the baseline that you use to compare the test results?

·         What is the acceptable time for a functionality response?

·         Who will validate that the baseline is good enough?

Consider the costs

·         What is the hardware costs that you need to use to accomplish test project goals?

·         Do you have the budget to perform all the testing cycle that you need?

·         How can you reduce the costs without affecting the testing process?

·         Do you need to use 3^rd party tools that will increase the costs?

·         Can you use open-source tools to reduce the costs?

·         What are the costs if you need external support?

·         What is the cost for each day of testing?

Testing Considerations

·         How do you intend to monitor the process when running on large volumes?

·         Can you reset the testing environment between each testing cycle?

·         How many users should be involved in the testing process?

·         How many test cycles do you intend to run?

Resources to monitor

·         Define the physical resources to be monitored throughout the test execution, Examples:

-          Memory (RAM).

-          Network transactions.

-          Processor.

-          I/O Disks.

·         Define the software resources to be monitored throughout the test execution, Examples:

-          Web Server.

-          Database Server

-          .NET

-          Classification Engine

-          System Services.

-          Different Software Cache