eValid V9 Operation with IE8 Confirmed

We are pleased to announce that eValid V9 is now certified operational with the newly released IE8.

As eValid users know, eValid uses the same DLLs for page rendering as the underlying IE browser, and the certification here should tell users that they will have no difficulty in upgrading to IE8 in terms of script compatibility and overall script reliability.

Validation of eValid V9 on IE8 assures users of continued upward compatibility of functonal testing and
server loading scripts.

Webinar: Monitoring Complex AJAX Applications with eValid and Hyperic

Improve complex web application monitoring using eValid functional tests and direct reporting into Hyperic's Network Reporting Engine

Thursday, 19 March 2009 — 2:00 PM Eastern Time / 11:00 AM Pacific Time

Outline

In times like these, reliability of your web application really counts! You want the peace of mind that ANY customer who uses your e-commerce application will have a good experience!

And, if your web application uses AJAX -- as so many of the newest applications do -- having confidence that your application is running normally is even more crucial to your bottom line.

This webinar details use of the eValid functional test engine in "monitoring mode" to perform availability and performance checks of complex web applications -- including AJAX applications.

Once the data is collected by eValid playbacks, the information transported and displayed in the Hyperic network status indicator system.

Speaker - Edward Miller, eValid's Chief Architect, will discuss key aspects of use of eValid as a Rich Internet Application (RIA) monitoring engine:

* How to create reliable, reproducible tests quickly and inexpensively.
* How to tag key performance data to monitor application performance.
* How to handle playback synchronization in AJAX applications.
* How to integrate eValid results into network monitoring engines, and Hyperic in particular.

Speaker - Marty Messer, Hyperic's Director of Customer Success, will describe the Hyperic monitoring solution:

* How to include eValid-produced data into the Hyperic architecture.
* Show how Hyperic reports application performance results.
* Explain how to integrate eValid data into status monitoring products.


Moderator - Rita Bral, VP/Communications of Software Research, will act as moderator for the webinar, drawing upon her years of experience as a communicator (Rita speaks five languages), and her credentials as an event organizer.

LoadTest Monitor Display, DOM Synchronization Support Items

• LoadTest Monitor Display Snapshot
  Recently we completed a fairly large server looading project that involved 100's and 100's of simulated users. Along the way we generated this ScreenShot that shows the images of 100 eValid copies (minimized, tiled in cascading form). If you study the 30-second video carefully you can see the individual eValid copies executing individual script steps. Note: The video clip is 20 MBytes and is set up to run in Windows Media Player.

• Adaptive Playback and DOM Synchronization
  There have been a number of questions lately about how the adaptive playback feature in eValid interacts with the use of in-the-browser DOM-based synchronization. As eValid users may know, adaptive playback is a method built into eValid that allows a playback to compensate for a limited range of changes in the underlying web page. eValid includes this feature because it makes tests less brittle and therefor extends their life.

  Here is a new writeup that gives a detailed Adaptive DOM Synchronization Explanation concentrating on a subset of the available commands that perform this kind of action. We've found that the combination of DOM-based sync plus use of adaptive playback makes a lot of sense when functional tests that are used in "monitoring mode" -- that is, when they are run hundreds or thousands of times a day to confirm continued operation of a complex web application.

Current Conferences & Technical Community Events

Here are references to interesting upcoming technical conferences that should be of interest to the Web Quality Community:

• Empirical Studies in Software Architecture: Opportunities, Approaches and Challenges, a Special issue of the Empirical Software Engineering Journal.
• 4th International Workshop on Automation of Software Test, part of ICSE 2009, 16-24 May 2009, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
• 5th TAROT Summer School on Software Testing, 6-10 July 2000, Las Navas del Marques, Spain, EU.
• 1st Workshop on Testing Technologies and Tools for Critical Industry Applications (T4CIA'09), part of SSIRI 2009, 8-10 July 2009, Shangha, China.
• 3rd International Workshop on Random Testing (RT09), co-located with QSIC 2009, 24-25 August 2009, Jeju Island, Korea.
• Software Testing: The Practice and The Science, (LASER Summer School on Softwre Engineering), 6-12 September 2009, Elba Island, Italy, EU.

These events deserve careful consideration, so please take a look!

Adaptive Playback and DOM Synchronization

There have been a number of questions lately about how the adaptive playback feature in eValid interacts with the use of in-the-browser DOM-based synchronization.

As you may know, adaptive playback is a method built into eValid that allows a playback to compensate for a limited range of changes in the underlying web page. eValid includes this because it makes tests less brittle and therefor extends their life.

Here is a new writeup that gives a detailed Adaptive DOM Synchronization Explanation, concentrating on a subset of the available commands that perform this kind of action.

We've found that the combination of DOM-based sync plus use of adaptive playback makes a lot of sense when functional tests that are used in "monitoring mode" -- that is, when they are run hundreds or thousands of times a day, to confirm continued operation of a complex web application.

eValid V8 Support Ending

With the introduction of eValid V9 we are strongly recommending users to move up to the latest eValid builds. V9 installations will experience better performance and are likely to be more reliable.

As has been our practice in prior years, formal support for eValid V8 will be ending at 30 April 2009.