JMeter as a functional testing tool and easily extendable tool

With the growth of software development expectations and new technologies like Hadoop, we need a tool that can fulfill most of our functional testing needs.

Software development includes functional testing no matter which methodology you are using: Waterfall, Agile, or any other. With the rapid growth of software development expectations and new technologies like Hadoop, we need a tool that can fulfill most of our functional testing needs. Apache Jmeter is one of these tools, although it is mostly used as a performance tool and is commercialized in this matter. In this paper, we will show examples where Jmeter can be used as a functional testing tool which enables the users to adapt it for their needs and define the main advantages of using this open-source testing tool.

Can Jmeter be used for everything?

With the new emerging technologies like Hadoop, there is a lack of functional testing tools which support these .

When using a paid testing tool, you will get the needed support, but it might be too late. As with the agile methodology, you need the possibility to create your tests as soon as the development starts, you have your sprint, and there is no time for dependencies where you are waiting weeks for a solution to your testing needs. That is why jmeter can be used as the primary functional testing tools, as it enables us to extend it to meet our needs.

Another positive side of using jmeter is the possibility to use this tool as incorporated into Continuous Integration (CI) process. Our CI includes:

• execution jmeter from command line
• test scripts which are stored on svn and are delivered with the build
• creation of the CI flow by using anthill
• transformation of jmeter results into a html page

To achieve the automation there exist several plugins:

• Hudson jmeter plugin (http://wiki.hudson-ci.org/display/HUDSON/JMeter+Plugin)
• Jmeter Maven plugin (http://wiki.apache.org/jmeter/JMeterMavenPlugin)
• Jmeter ant task (http://www.programmerplanet.org/pages/projects/jmeter-ant-task.php)