Case Study - Compunnel.com

Case Study
Case Study
Performance Testing For Student Application
US-based For-profit University (Higher Education)
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© 2014 Compunnel Software Group
Compunnel’s Performance Testing Solution Delivers Impressive Student Experience
for a US-based University
Our Customer
Customer at a glance:
Our client is a United States-based private, for-profit higher education institution that provides postsecondary education services. The university enrolls about 38,000 students through its online learning
programs, and at 100 campuses located in 24 states of the United States.
- One of the largest adult
education-focused
accredited online
universities in America.
The university adopts an instructional model, that combines on-campus and online classes, designed
to help students further their educational needs. To enable a blended learning curricula, the university
has developed an out of the box, “MyClient” application that allows students to enroll in classes and
view other relevant courses in the application. Having a stable student portal is critical to satisfy the
university's student needs and deliver a high level of service. It also impacts the university’s credibility
and future success.
- The university has been
successfully educating
working adults for over
120 yrs.
The university was looking forward to conduct performance, load and compatibility testing for this
application to ensure that the application is easily available and accessible to the users.
The Customer’s Challenges
During peak sessions, the ‘MyClient’ application receives huge web traffic with extended login
sessions. Due to this, the student portal was saturated and was not able to handle the volume
effectively. This resulted in poor application performance and students reported difficulties in
accessing their courses online. For this reason, the university identified performance testing as an
essential to the success of their ‘MyClient’ student portal.
Apart from application performance related challenges, the university also faced the following
roadblocks:
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Unavailability of a central team dedicated to testing business critical applications
Silo-centric methods and lack of proficiency in testing leading to high resource costs
Limited resources available in-house and a tight deadline
Limited code-level understanding, as the application was developed by another vendor
Environment optimization and recommendations for the App or DB Server performance at
code or hardware level.
For the new academic session, the university wanted to launch a much more stable application for its
students and achieve higher student satisfaction. Compunnel partnered with the university to help in
predicting the system behavior and application performance.
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Case Study
© 2014 Compunnel Software Group
- The university enrolls
about 38,000 students
through its online learning
programs, and at 100
campuses located in 24 US
states.
Compunnel’s Performance Testing Solution
Approach to Performance Testing
Compunnel defined a holistic phase by phase approach ensuring a standardized testing framework to
deliver predictability and consistency. Our framework took a predictive approach with emphasis on
detailed analysis and planning before starting the actual testing. Key milestones of our approach
were:
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Discovery Stage - Tool Identification, Test Bed Definition, Establish Performance Scenarios
Test Environment Setup Stage- Test Bed Setup, Performance Test Script Development,
Baseline Benchmarking
Script Execution - Stress, Load Test with incremental load
Reporting - Analysis and final recommendations
Best practices adopted were:
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Checklist and scenarios identified for tweaking page level and site level performance
Quality, productivity, effort and schedule metrics were monitored at all stages
Periodic reviews and regular customer feedback was gathered
Compunnel’s Performance Testing Solution:
Compunnel recommended the use of WAPT 7.5 as a performance testing tool for the ‘MyClient’
application. After a preliminary analysis, Compunnel’s test team set up a test environment for emulating
concurrent users to put the application through user-loads.
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© 2014 Compunnel Software Group
Case Study
Application Specification:
- Number of Tiers: Web
tier/MySQL DB
- Protocols being used:
https
- Middleware: Custom
Java login application
running on Tomcat
- Database engine: MySQL
for Drupal
- Web Server: Apache for
Drupal
- Coding languages used:
Drupal/PHP
- Types of encryption: SSL,
terminated on F5 Load
Balancer.
- Certificates (e.g.
VeriSign): Entrust
Predicting system behavior and application performance to improve student
satisfaction
Key milestones covered during the design and execution stages were:
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Test Bed Setup & Test Scripting
Test Scenarios Identification for Performance Testing
Script Development for Individual and Mixed Scenarios
Script Execution with maximum transactions per second in order to simulate maximum
concurrent users in terms of transactions
Analysis and report preparation
Final recommendation and performance report shared with the client
The application was tested for:
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Response time of API calls with varied applications
Concurrent user-load simulated from 5 to 32,000 users
Time for page load at different load levels
Application environment optimization and re-tests for post-optimization results
Results
Home page response enhanced to 0.75 seconds from 22 seconds post optimization.
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© 2014 Compunnel Software Group
Case Study
- Simulated performance
testing with a user-load of
32,000 users.
- Home page response
optimization enhanced
from 22 seconds to 0.75
seconds.
- Database server was
identified as causing the
major bottleneck.
Case Study
DB Server memory was identified as causing the major bottleneck.
- Predicting the system
behavior and
performance, led to
optimization of the
complete student portal.
- Boosted the reputation
of the university by
providing students with
reliable and fast access to
courses.
- Reduced costs through
zero downtime and ability
to fix issues early.
Business Benefits
Although the ‘MyClient’ application is a simple application, its structure is complex as it receives data
inputs from various databases. As a result of Compunnel’s holistic performance testing solution, the
university received significant benefits.
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Enhanced Productivity- Efficient response time of the “MyClient” application reduced the overall
course completion timeline
Critical application defects that cause capacity outages were eliminated
Workload on the helpdesk reduced significantly due to a minimum number of system related
complaints
A 100% available application provided a high quality student experience, culminating in
increased student satisfaction
© 2014 Compunnel Software Group
Case Study
The Compunnel Difference
Compunnel – The Right Choice
Compunnel has been providing successful customer outcomes to global organizations for nearly 20
years. Backed by deep domain expertise in multiple industries, we offer specialized quality assurance
solutions along with exceptional project management based on processes perfected over the duration
of Compunnel’s existence.
Compunnel provides consultative advice on the most effective approaches and ways to save on
costs. We explain how we will ensure that each project is primed for success. We provide roadmap
assessments and consultative guidance, discovery, design, building, deployment and operational
support. Compunnel works from a foundation focused on data governance and architecture. We
provide highly specialized and cost-effective teams–drawing from our expert IT resources of 1,000+
worldwide. We help organizations significantly reduce costs, typically up to 40% less, with our flexible
onsite and offshore model.
For more information about Compunnel’s
Quality Assurance Services,
visit www.compunnel.com, call (800) 696-8128 or email us at
[email protected].
Compunnel Software Group is a leading global business technology services company. Recognized
for our comprehensive portfolio of technology services and outsourcing solutions, we combine
extensive industry knowledge with highly tailored application development and information
management services.
Application
Development
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© 2014 Compunnel Software Group
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Intelligence
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Compunnel is a leading
provider of Independent
Quality Assurance and
Software Testing services.
For almost 20 years, we
have been helping our
esteemed customers,
improve IT quality
management and
deployment, maintain
control over constant
changes and reduce
delivery costs with our
combined onsite and
offshore model.