RedTurtle: Funkload: a simple buildout to spread and run your test!

Recently we faced a performance issue on a Plone site, which has been reported to be slower than expected.

The application, after a migration to a new hardware, has shown to be a bit lazy compared to the expectations.

Because of the weird behaviour and confident on our Plone installation, we assumed a hardware misconfiguration.
But without evidence (numbers in this case), a claim is merely an opinion.

So, to get ride of the problem, we decided to perform multiple load test on different servers, and then compare the results.

Funkload

http://ziade.org/2011/07/27/how-to-stress-test-your-app-using-funkload-part-1

So, let's see how to set a Funkload test within a buildout.

git clone https://github.com/nicolasenno/funkload.buildout
cd funkload.buildout
virtualenv --no-site-packages .
. bin/activate

Then the buildout.cfg (download from github):

[buildout]
parts = 
    bench-tools
    gnuplot
    versions = versions

[bench-tools]
recipe = zc.recipe.egg:scripts
eggs =
    docutils
    funkload 
    tcpwatch
initialization =
import os
os.environ['TCPWATCH'] = "${buildout:bin-directory}/tcpwatch"

[gnuplot]
recipe = zc.recipe.cmmi
url = http://sourceforge.net/projects/gnuplot/files/gnuplot/4.6.2/gnuplot-4.6.2.tar.gz/download
configure-options = --bindirThe test=${buildout:directory}/bin

[versions]
funkload = 1.16.1
 

Gnuplot can be installed directly from buildout, as suggested by Alessandro Pisa on his blog post.

import unittest
from random import random
from funkload.FunkLoadTestCase import FunkLoadTestCase

PAGES = (('Homepage', ''),
         ('path1', 'contacts'),
         ('path2', 'media'),
         )

class Site(FunkLoadTestCase):
    """This test use a configuration file Site.conf."""

    def setUp(self):
        """Setting up test."""
        self.server_url = self.conf_get('main', 'url')

    def test_app(self):
        ''' site path
        '''
        server_url = self.server_url

        for title, page in PAGES:
            url = "/".join((server_url, page))
            self.get(url, description='Get %s' % title)

Then we can use a Makefile to automate the launch process:

LOG_HOME := var/funkload/log
REPORT_HOME := var/funkload/data

ifdef URL
    FLOPS = -u $(URL) $(EXT)
else
    FLOPS = $(EXT)
endif

ifdef REPORT_HOME
    REPORT = $(REPORT_HOME)
else
    REPORT = report
endif

all: test

test: start test-app

bench: start bench-app

start:
    mkdir -p $(REPORT)  $(LOG_HOME)

test-app:
    fl-run-test -d --debug-level=3 --simple-fetch site_test.py Site.test_app $(FLOPS)

bench-app:
    fl-run-bench --simple-fetch site_test.py Site.test_app -c 1:5:10:15:20:30:40:50 -D 45 -m 0.1 -M .5 -s 1 $(FLOPS)
    fl-build-report $(LOG_HOME)/site-bench.xml --html -o $(REPORT)

clean:

If you prefer, as an improvement, you can generate this file within the buildout itself.
Take a look to collective.recipe.template for more information.

Here we are!
A couple of shell commands and you will be ready to run the test.

From your buildout directory, type:

make test
make test URL=http://override-url/
make bench

At this point a full report will be ready in "{buildout dir}/var/funkload/data" (path depends on your configuration).

Conclusion

As you can see install and run a Funkload load test it's just matter of few steps.
Thanks to it, we have been able to prove our thesis with numbers.

I think it's not a bad idea add it into my checklist of things to do for every site deployment. It could become useful in many other cases.

Recommended reading

http://blog.redturtle.it/how-to-write-funkload-test-in-few-minutes

http://www.martinaspeli.net/articles/tools-for-a-successful-plone-project