Synthetic transaction monitor

• US 20030055883A1
• Filed: 03/29/2002
• Published: 03/20/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 03/30/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: BMC Software Incorporated (KKR & Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: BMC Software Incorporated (KKR & Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Wiles, Philip V. Jr.
• Granted Patent: US 7,506,047 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3414 Workload generation, e.g. scripts, playback
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3495 for systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/87 Monitoring of transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/875 Monitoring of systems including the internet
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/88 Monitoring involving counting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5003 Managing SLA; Interaction between SLA and QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5009 Determining service level performance parameters or violations of service level contracts, e.g. violations of agreed response time or mean time between failures [MTBF]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5012 determining service availability, e.g. which services are available at a certain point in time
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/00 Arrangements for monitoring or testing data switching networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0852 Delays
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing

Abstract

Systems and methods for recording and replaying client-server transactions on selected clients in order to gauge the performance of the client-server system from the perspective of the client. In one embodiment, a method comprises playing back a set of recorded transactions on a client, monitoring selected performance-related parameters at the client, and transmitting monitored data to the server for analysis or for viewing by a system administrator. The set of transactions is recorded on a first client by replacing a standard Internet transaction driver (e.g., WinInet.DLL) with a modified driver that is configured to intercept function calls. The function calls and corresponding parameters are recorded in a file which is later transmitted to a client, where the recorded transaction information is used to reproduce the transactions on the client. As the transactions are played back, performance data may be monitored and forwarded to a management server for analysis, display, etc.

Claims

1. A method for monitoring synthetic transactions on a client, comprising:

providing a first set of recorded client-server transactions;

playing back the first set of recorded transactions on a client;

monitoring selected parameters associated with the first set of recorded transactions; and

transmitting performance data based on the selected parameters to a server.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the client-server transactions comprise TCP/IP transactions.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the client-server transactions comprise web browser transactions.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the performance data comprises one or more values computed using the selected parameters.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the performance data comprises one or more values of the selected parameters.

6. The method of claim 1, installing an application on a client, wherein the application is configured to play back sets of recorded transactions on the client.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the application is installed on the client prior to providing the first set of transactions to the client.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising setting up server-side connections prior to playing back the first set of recorded transactions.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the client-server transactions comprise FTP transactions.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising identifying differences between actual and recorded HTML object trees and modifying recorded requests prior to issuance of the requests in playback.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein modifying recorded requests comprises identifying objects in the actual HTML object tree to replace objects in the recorded requests, wherein the replaced objects do not exist in identical form in the actual HTML object tree.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising queueing requests until all associated requests are received, and issuing the queued requests when all of the associated requests have been received.

13. A method for recording client-server transactions comprising:

loading a modified library for handling client-server transactions, wherein the modified library is configured to cause API calls corresponding to the client-server transactions to be made available for recording;

enabling the modified driver;

performing one or more client-server transactions; and

recording the one or more client-server transactions.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the modified library is the Microsoft Internet API library (WinInet.DLL).

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the one or more client-server transactions comprise Internet Explorer transactions.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the modified driver is a TDI filter driver.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the one or more client-server transactions comprise TCP/IP transactions.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the one or more client-server transactions comprise FTP transactions.

19. A software program product comprising a computer-readable medium containing one or more instructions, wherein the one or more instructions are configured to cause a computer to perform the method comprising:

reading a first set of recorded client-server transactions;

playing back the first set of recorded transactions on a client;

monitoring selected parameters associated with the first set of recorded transactions; and

transmitting performance data based on the selected parameters to a server.

20. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the client-server transactions comprise TCP/IP transactions.

21. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the client-server transactions comprise web browser transactions.

22. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the performance data comprises one or more values computed using the selected parameters.

23. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the performance data comprises one or more values of the selected parameters.

24. The software program product of claim 19, installing an application on a client, wherein the application is configured to play back sets of recorded transactions on the client.

25. The software program product of claim 24, wherein the application is installed on the client prior to providing the first set of transactions to the client.

26. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the method further comprises setting up server-side connections prior to playing back the first set of recorded transactions.

27. The software program product of claim 26, wherein the client-server transactions comprise FTP transactions.

28. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the method further comprises identifying differences between actual and recorded HTML object trees and modifying recorded requests prior to issuance of the requests in playback.

29. The software program product of claim 28, wherein modifying recorded requests comprises identifying objects in the actual HTML object tree to replace objects in the recorded requests, wherein the replaced objects do not exist in identical form in the actual HTML object tree.

30. The software program product of claim 19, wherein the method further comprises queueing requests until all associated requests are received, and issuing the queued requests when all of the associated requests have been received.

31. A software program product comprising a computer-readable medium containing one or more instructions, wherein the one or more instructions are configured to cause a computer to perform the method comprising:

performing one or more client-server transactions;

intercepting function calls for performing the one or more client-server transactions; and

recording the function calls corresponding to the one or more client-server transactions.

32. The software program product of claim 31, wherein the function calls are intercepted by a modified Microsoft Internet API library (WinInet.DLL).

33. The software program product of claim 32, wherein the one or more client-server transactions comprise Internet Explorer transactions.

34. The software program product of claim 31, wherein the modified driver is a TDI filter driver.

35. The software program product of claim 34, wherein the one or more client-server transactions comprise TCP/IP transactions.

36. The software program product of claim 35, wherein the one or more client-server transactions comprise FTP transactions.