JMeter Tutorial - Writing a Test Plan

In this tutorial, we will write a very simple test plan.

Here are the specs of the Test Application we will run JMeter against:

• large instance on EC2
• Ubuntu LTS12.04
• Tomcat 7
• Java and Spring

Setting up JMeter on Windows

We will be setting up JMeter on Windows simply because it's easier. Read User Load Testing Simulation - Installing Apache JMeter on Windows 2012 Base.


Creating a Thread Group

Start JMeter by clicking on bin/ApacheJMeter.jar in your install location. You will see in the Tree hierarchy that it has a Test Plan item and a WorkBench item.

Right click on Test Plan -> Add -> Threads (Users) -> Thread Group

The Thread Group tells JMeter how many users and requests it should simulate.

In the Thread Group panel, fill in the following:

Name: Web Users
Number of Threads (users): 10
Ramp-Up Period (in seconds): 0
Loop Count: 5

The above will generate 5 requests for each of the 10 users. Total number of requests is 50.

The Ramp-Up Period defines the time delay which each JMeter will start the user. If Ramp-Up Period is 10 and Number of Threads is 10 then the delay between each user is 1 second. In the above, we have Ramp-Up Period = 0, meaning that all the users will start at the same time.


Add Default HTTP Request Information

Since most requests we are going to make will share some common properties (like IP and port), we will set up some default HTTP Request Information.

Right click on Web Users -> Add -> Config Element -> HTTP Request Defaults.

Fill in your server name (or IP) and port number.


Add Cookies

We will add HTTP Cookies.

Right click on Web Users -> Add -> Config Element -> HTTP Cookie Manager


Adding a HTTP Request

This is where your simulated users will request. We will add a login request. You will need to figure out what are your site's username and password parameters (In my case, it's username and password)

Right click on Web Users -> Add -> Sampler -> HTTP Request

Fill in the following:

Name: Login
Server Name of IP: /
Method: POST

In parameters, click Add.

Add Name=username, Value={your_username}
Add Name=password, Value={your password}

You can add a GET a request similarly as well.


Adding the Graph Results Listener

To observe response time, we can add the Graph Results Listener.

Right click on Web Users -> Add -> Listener -> Graph Results.


Running the Test Plan

In the menu bar, click on Run -> Start