Capability Complexity Configuration

Capability Complexities

Silk Performer uses abstract values, or complexities, to relate sets of capability resource requirements to one another. A capability is a technology that an agent is able to replay.

With dynamic workload-assignment, this is used for the following operations:

1. To sort agents by the sum of their capability complexities. This is used to assign user types to agents that have the lowest capability complexity first.
2. To sort user types by the sum of their associated scripts' capability complexity. This is used to assign user types that have the highest complexity first. Combined with operation 1 (above), this results in user types with the highest complexity being assigned to the agents that best fit the required capabilities.
3. To compute the default number of virtual users of an agent for each of its capabilities. For an agent, the number of virtual users for the General capability is computed based on the CPU speed, the number of CPUs, and available RAM. Using this value and the list of capability complexities, the number of available virtual users for all other capabilities is computed.

Example XML File

To override capability complexity values, you must create an XML file named CapabilityComplexities.xml and save it to <public user documents>\Silk Performer 20.0.

Such an XML file might look like this:

<Complexities>
  <Capability name="SAPGUI" complexity="150"/>
  <Capability name="ODBC" complexity="65"/>
</Complexities>

This example XML file overrides the complexity values for the SAPGUI and ODBC capabilities. All other values remain unchanged. The file can contain '0-n' Capability tags. The list of capability names is included in the table above.

Please note that specific complexity values are not that important. The important thing is what the values are in relation to each other. This has the consequence that if you were to multiply all complexities by the same factor, the relation of any two capabilities to each other would not change.

Setting a Default Number of Virtual Users

In some situations it is helpful to define a default number of virtual users for a capability (for example, to accommodate a technical constraint of the technology under test). This can be achieved by extending the capabilities defined in CapabilityComplexities.xml with maxVU attributes. For example, <Complexities> <Capability name="GuiLTest" complexity="200" maxVU="30" /> </Complexities>. The value specified in the maxVU attribute overrides the value that would otherwise be computed through the capability complexities. A maxVU value of 0 (which is the default when no maxVU attribute is specified) indicates that the default number of virtual users should be computed through the capability complexities.

Currently, the following fixed maximum VUser values are in effect by default:

• SAPGUI - 75 VUsers
• Citrix - 30 VUsers
• GuiLTest - 30 VUsers
• Browser-driven - 100 VUsers