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Recording

SOASTA CloudTest features two exciting new ways to capture information for your tests—HTTP(S) Recording captures traffic at the message-level and Browser Recording captures user actions performed within your browser using a browser target.
 
  • Browser Recording

SOASTA CloudTest’s Browser Recording feature is a unique browser-based capability that automates the creation of typical Web UI/Ajax test cases by recording and presenting user Browser Actions from the target Web application within the Test Clip Editor. User actions are captured and test clip components are created from them. This capability allows user interaction with your Web UI/Ajax to be quickly captured for use in your tests. Browser recording requires install of the Browser Recorder Installer add-on (and additionally, install the Conductor Installer for playback only). Both can be found in the Download section of the Welcome page.

The browser recording mechanism simply requires a WebUI/Ajax target. Browser targets are defined in the Target Definition Wizard.


The WebUI/Ajax target selected in the Test Clip Editor screenshot has the name Sample Pages WebUI Ajax Target. Selecting it in the list brings the test site up in the center of the workspace. Messages have been added to the test clip simply by clicking in the target site.


TIP:  You can click the Pop Out icon to launch the target site in its own window.

When the test clip is complete and a Test Composition is created from it, open the target in the Target Editor and choose your Conductor and Browser settings.

In Repository > Conductors find the Conductor selected named in the target and then use the Browser Driving tab to determine which browsers to play back any Test Composition using it. The Settings shown will open 10 browser instances in both Safari and Firefox browsers, which will run the test simultaneously.
  • HTTP(S) Recording

SOASTA CloudTest’s HTTP(S) Recording feature is a browser-based visual tool that automates the creation of typical usage scenarios by recording and then presenting HTTP(S) message traffic between the client and the target Web application within the Recording Editor. This feature requires that you download and install the Conductor Installer in the Download section of the Welcome page. Information presented within this Editor can then be filtered for relevance and easily converted to SOASTA’s Test Clip format. The Recordings list contains any HTTPS recordings you have created using the SOASTA CloudTest Conductor and one or more web sites that you are testing.

While the Conductor runs, recordings created using the SOASTA Central > Repository > Recordings feature will capture all the network traffic from a configured client machine that has that Conductor installed. The Conductor is run as a separate application on the desktop machine. You can filter out unwanted traffic from IM clients and undesirable web sites by using filtering.

 

Play Control

The Recording process captures HTTP and HTTPS traffic as well as packet-level data. You can inspect information about the captured data, including the number of messages. The Recording Editor provides the following additional filters that can improve the end result—your converted Test Clip:
  • Hide/Show Packets

You can toggle packet view to make things more clear
  • Filter

You can click Filter to specify criteria by which to display by clicking the Filter icon, including by URL, Destination IP, Source IP, Method (GET or POST), Duration, and Count
  • List

You can inspect the recording in List view (after recording is stopped) to make better sense of what you’ve captured

Once a recording is created, it can then be easily converted into the SOASTA CloudTest Test Clip format using the Convert to a Clip button.
SOASTA CloudTest’s record features result in a dramatic leap forward in browser-based web testing since a Test Clip can be added to a Test Composition multiple times representing many virtual users.

Create a Recording

SOASTA CloudTest features two exciting new ways to capture information for your tests—HTTP(S) Recording and Browser Recording. Although both types of recording capture test data from a web site, HTTP(S) Recording does so at the message level, while Browser Recording captures user actions. Use the following procedures to create either type.

 

Create a Browser Recording Clip

The following steps will use a WebUI/Ajax target to create a new Test.

  1. From the Welcome page, click Browser Recording

--Or—
With Repository > Test Clips selected, click New to launch the Test Clip Editor.

  1. In either case, the Test Clip Editor opens with a new Untitled Test Clip.
  1. In the Available Targets list on the lower-left, locate your WebUI/Ajax target. For example, Sample Pages WebUI Ajax Target.
  1. Select the target and double-click it, or press the green arrow. The target is placed into the Included Targets list and its Operations appear on the far right.

When you do so, the target web site appears in the center of the workspace.
  1. Perform the user actions you want to test. Browser actions are added to the Test Clip as you perform these actions.
  • Use the Minimize/Maximize icons on the far right of the pane tab bar to toggle the view.
  • Click the Show/Hide WebUI Page to increase the workspace when you are  editing the test clip.
  • Click the Pop Out icon if you prefer to perform user actions with your web site in a separate window.

To examine details for any captured Browser Action, first select it in the Test Clip workspace above, and then click the Properties button on the lower-left.

When you do so, the Selected: Browser Action (for example, 12) appears in the pane below. You can further define Inputs (Locator, Coordinate String), Waits (Pre-Action Waits, Post-Action Waits), define expected Outputs, and Validations, as well as define Property Sets, and Custom Properties.
  • Optionally, you may add Checkpoints and Time Delays as with any Test Clip. Click the Clip tab to do so, or to define Custom Properties for the entire clip.
  • When you have finished your edits, click Save on the Repository Toolbar.
  • Give the clip a name.

Create an HTTP(S) Recording

SOASTA CloudTest’s HTTP(S) Recording feature is a browser-based visual tool that automates the creation of typical usage scenarios by recording and then presenting HTTP(S) message traffic between the client and the target Web application within the Recording Editor.

Recording Your User Scenario

Note: The following procedure requires the SOASTA Conductor.
The following steps detail how to capture user actions from within your browser. For best results, clear your browser’s cache before proceeding.

  
  1. Locate and launch your Conductor application.

    The Conductor opens with the status “running”.

    If you need to stop or start the Conductor at any given time, simply click Stop Conductor or Start Conductor. 
  2. To begin recording, go to SOASTA Central > Repository > Recordings and then click New.

The Recording Editor page appears with Step 1: Select the conductor to record from displayed.

  1. Select your Conductor from the list.
  1. Click Next. Step 2: Select the network interface and optional filters appears. 

    Ensure that your Conductor’s status is “connected”.

If your Conductor is not connected, the following steps will not work.

Disconnects are most likely caused by not starting the Conductor prior to this step, however, disconnection can also be caused by entering invalid authentication credentials for the client machine, or by mistyped and/or obsolete server locations.
  • Select your physical network interface from the Interface drop down.

In the screenshot to the right, the network interface is an Ethernet card with the IP address 192.168.1.120.
Note:  Typically, choose the interface associated with your physical network card. Other interfaces such as VPN connections, Wireless adapters, and Parallels adapters (on Mac) are also shown.
  • The Filter Options > Record HTTP Traffic only is checked by default. If you’d like to record low-level traffic such as DHCP requests, uncheck this box.

If you are using a hosted version of SOASTA CloudTest or are testing a secured site using HTTPS, click the box to Enable HTTPS Recording.
  1. Optionally, specify additional filtering information in the Filter (tcpdump format) field.

    For example, you can filter for a host or filter out a host by specifying phrases such as:

Specifying a host will only record traffic to the domain (omitting other traffic such as Instant Message clients running on your machine)
—Or—

You can link together more than one argument by using the “or” operative.
  1. Optionally, enter a name for your Recording other than the default name shown. The default name is constructed by the name of the Interface above combined with the date and time.
  1. Optionally, click Browse if you’d like to store your recording in a specific SOASTA CloudTest folder.
  • Open a second browser window (or tab) with the site you want to test and then prepare to perform user actions on that site.

    For this example, we will use the SOASTA Sample Web Site. This site has been provided for the purpose of this tutorial.


    You can locate this site by logging into SOASTA CloudTest and navigating to Welcome > Quick Links > SOASTA WebUI/Ajax Samples > SOASTA Web Site
  1. With this site (or any other site you want to test) open, return to the Recording Editor and then click Record.

The Recorder goes into listening mode.

  
  1. In the second window where your site is open, perform the user actions that you want to test.

    The Recording Editor will populate the editor workspace with messages that are captured from your actions.

For example, HTTP GET and PUT actions that are a result of your user actions on the test site are captured.
  1. Click the Stop button if you’d like to finish the recording and then filter. You can also leave the recording running and choose to filter data on the fly.

In either case, check the traffic that is captured.

The Recording Editor provides the following additional filters that can improve the end result—your converted Test Clip:

  • Hide/Show Packets

You can toggle packet view to make things more clear

  • Filter

You can click Filter to specify criteria by which to display by clicking the Filter icon, including by URL, Destination IP, Source IP, Method (GET or POST), Duration, and Count
  • List

You can inspect the recording in List view (after recording is stopped) to make better sense of what you’ve captured

  • Play Control

You can inspect information about the captured data, including the number of messages.

You can also view results in List View if the recording has been stopped (list view is unavailable while recording).
  1. To do so, click Filter.

You can filter by the following criteria: URL, Host Name, Destination IP, Source IP, Method, Duration, Count, Response Code, and Protocol.

For example, if you recorded against the Sample Pages site listed in the steps above, click Filter and in the drop-down lists select URL, Contains, and then enter /SamplePages.
  1. Click Apply to view the filter results. Optionally, add or subtract criteria by clicking the plus ( + ) or minus ( – ) buttons.
  1. Click the drop-down list and define filter criteria.
  1. If you are recording on the fly using filters as you go, click the Stop button to end the recording. If you are filtering after recording finalize your filters.

    The Play/Stop control panel disappears, and the Editor posts Recording Finished in the upper right corner, leaving only the recorded contents of your session.
  
  1. Once you have settled on a final set of clips, click Convert to a Clip or exit the Recording Editor and convert the clip at a later time. One recording can be used to create many different clips (optionally, using different filter critieria.
  

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