Method and system for monitoring the performance of a distributed application

• US 7,600,014 B2
• Filed: 11/14/2001
• Issued: 10/06/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 11/16/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Clouding Corporation (Marathon Patent Group, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Symantec Corporation (NortonLifeLock Inc.)
• Inventors: Chen, John Bradley, Aikas, Erkki Ville Juhani, Russell, Ethan George, Cote, Stephen William, Marsh, Brian David
• Primary Examiner(s): STRANGE, AARON N
• Application Number:
  US09/991,127
• Publication Number:
  US 20020099818A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,883 Days
• Field of Search: 709/217, 709/219, 709/223, 709/224, 715/736
• US Class Current: 709/224
• 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 41/509 wherein the managed service relates to media content delivery, e.g. audio, video or TV
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5096 wherein the managed service relates to distributed or central networked applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/142 Managing session states for stateless protocols; Signalling session states; State transitions; Keeping-state mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]

Abstract

A service monitor and a browser monitor determine performance metrics on both a server and a client in connection with a distributed application running on a network. While applicable to other types of distributed application data, an example is described in which a Web page is requested by a user running a browser program on the client computer. In response, the server transmits the requested Web page, along with JavaScript code that defines a browser monitor, to the client. A browser monitoring function controlled by this code determines a plurality of different performance metrics related to the access of Web pages by the client. In addition, the server monitor determines performance metrics specific to its function in providing the Web page to the client. A correlated performance metric is determined by combining a server performance metric with a browser performance metric.

Claims

1. A method for determining one or more performance metrics for a distributed application in which distributed application data are transferred from a first site to a second site over a network, the method comprising:

(a) receiving a request from a user for the distributed application data, the request being transmitted from the second site to the first site over the network;

(b) including machine instructions with the distributed application data that define a performance monitoring function, the machine instructions and the distributed application data being a single data file;

(c) including a monitor cookie with the distributed application data that indicates that the distributed application data are a monitored object;

(d) transmitting, in response to the request, the distributed application data from the first site to the second site over the network;

(e) detecting the monitor cookie at the second site;

(f) executing, in response to the monitor cookie being detected, the machine instructions at the second site to implement the performance monitoring function used to determine the one or more performance metrics for the distributed application without using the performance monitoring function to request any distributed application data from any site, at least one of the one or more performance metrics being determined in connection with timing of events occurring during the transmission of the distributed application data to the second site;

(g) determining a performance metric at the first site; and

(h) combining at least one of the one or more performance metrics determined at the second site with the performance metric determined at the first site to determine a correlated performance metric.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the performance monitoring function at the second site is initiated after the distributed application data are accessed at the second site.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising collecting the one or more performance metrics for the distributed application over the network.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein collecting the performance metrics includes applying a probabilistic sampling parameter to determine whether performance metrics are collected from each of a plurality of sites.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the probabilistic sampling parameter is applied on a per-site basis.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the probabilistic sampling parameter is applied on a per-request basis.

7. The method of claim 3, further comprising determining whether to collect a performance metric from the second site as a function of a specific performance metric that was determined at the second site.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the performance monitoring function at the second site determines one or more of:

(a) a render latency, corresponding to a time period required to fetch and display the distributed application data at the second site;

(b) a dwell latency, corresponding to a time period exhibited by a user requesting the distributed application data, before requesting other distributed application data;

(c) a per-image fetch latency, corresponding to a time period for fetching a specific image referenced in the distributed application data;

(d) an image arrival time, corresponding to a time at which a specific image, loaded as a part of accessing the distribution application data, arrives at the second site;

(e) a navigation status, corresponding to an event that brought a user to the distributed application data;

(f) a window resize event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user resized a window in which the distributed application data are accessed;

(g) a page stop event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user aborted loading the distributed application data;

(h) an image error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred while loading an image referenced in the distributed application data; and

(i) a JavaScript error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred during interpretation of JavaScript included in the distributed application data.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the distributed application data have a markup language format.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more performance metrics are determined without any apparent effect on the access of the distributed application data at the second site.

11. A method for determining and collecting at least one performance metric related to access of a Web page by a browser program on a client device, including at least a correlated performance metric for a network, the method comprising:

(a) enabling a user to request transfer of the Web page from a server device to the client device over a network;

(b) including machine instructions with the Web page that define a browser monitoring function;

(c) including a monitor cookie with the Web page that indicates that the Web page is a monitored document;

(d) transferring the Web page from the server device to the client device;

(e) detecting the monitor cookie when the Web page is transferred to the client device;

(f) when the Web page is loaded by the client device for rendering by the browser program, causing, in response to the monitor cookie being detected, the client device to execute the machine instructions that define how to carry out the browser monitoring function, the browser monitoring function being implemented without requiring any affirmative action by a user of the client device;

(g) determining the at least one performance metric on the client device with the browser monitoring function without using the browser monitoring function to request any Web page from any site, the at least one performance metric being determined in connection with timing of events occurring during the transmission of the distributed application data to the client device;

(h) determining a server performance metric; and

(i) combining the server performance metric with the at least one performance metric to determine the correlated performance metric.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising transmitting the at least one performance metric from the client device to a remote site over the network.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the remote site comprises a data center, and the method further comprises analyzing the at least one performance metric to determine performance data for the Web page, including the correlated performance metric.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising enabling a determination to be made of whether the at least one performance metric will be accepted for processing by the data center based upon a probabilistic sampling parameter.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the probabilistic sampling parameter is applied on a per-user basis to determine if the at least one performance metric will be accepted by the data center.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the probabilistic sampling parameter is applied on a per-Web page basis to determine if the at least one performance metric will be accepted by the data center.

17. The method of claim 13, wherein a plurality of different kinds of performance metrics can be determined by the browser monitoring function, and the method further comprises enabling the data center to selectively accept a performance metric as a function of the kind of performance metric being transmitted to the data center.

18. The method of claim 11, wherein determining the at least one performance metric is done without the client device providing any indication to the user of the client device that the at least one performance metric is being determined.

19. The method of claim 11, wherein when determining the at least one performance metric, the client device determines one or more of:

(a) a render latency, corresponding to a time period required to fetch and display all contents referenced within an Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) document on the client device;

(b) a dwell latency, corresponding to a time period exhibited by the user viewing the Web page, before navigating to a different Web page with the browser program;

(c) a per-image fetch latency, corresponding to a time period for fetching a specific image referenced in the Web page;

(d) an image arrival time, corresponding to a time at which a specific image, loaded as a part of rendering the Web page, arrives on the browser;

(e) a navigation status, corresponding to an event that brought the user to the Web page;

(f) a cache status, corresponding to a determination of whether the Web page was cached by the browser program or by a proxy;

(g) a window resize event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user resized a window in which the Web page is rendered;

(h) a page stop event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user aborted loading of the Web page;

(i) an image error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred while loading an image included in the Web page; and

(j) a JavaScript error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred during interpretation of JavaScript included in the Web page.

20. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one performance metric comprises a performance metric for each image included in the Web page.

21. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

(a) executing a server monitoring function on the server device that is transferring the Web page to the client device;

(b) determining the server performance metric related to the transfer of the Web page to the client device from the sewer device with the server monitoring function; and

(c) transmitting the server performance metric to a remote site for combination with the at least one performance metric determined by the browser monitoring function on the client device;

to determine the correlated performance of the network.

22. The method of claim 11, wherein combining the at least one performance metric determined by the browser monitoring function with the sewer performance metric determined by the server monitoring function determines a network latency.

23. A memory medium on which are stored machine readable instructions that, when executed by a client computing device, cause the client computing device to carry out a browser monitoring function, the browser monitoring function being implemented without requiring any affirmative action by a user of the client computing device and being used to:

detect whether a monitor cookie is included with a Web page that is transferred to the client computing device, the monitor cookie indicating that the Web page is a monitored document;

determine, in response to the monitor cookie being detected, at least one performance metric for the Web page on the client computing device, the at least one performance metric being related to access of the Web page by a browser program executed on the client computing device and being combined with another performance metric determined at a server computing device to determine a correlated performance metric, wherein the correlated performance metric is not determined using the browser monitoring function to request any Web page from any site.

24. The memory medium of claim 23, wherein the machine readable instructions cause the at least one performance metric to be transmitted to a remote site over a network for determination of the correlated performance metric.

25. The memory medium of claim 23, wherein the at least one performance metric is determined without the client device providing any indication to a user of the client device that the at least one performance metric is being determined.

26. The memory medium of claim 23, wherein the machine readable instructions determine one or more of the following performance metrics:

(a) a render latency, corresponding to a time period required to fetch and display all contents referenced within an HTML document on the client device;

(b) a dwell latency, corresponding to a time period exhibited by the user viewing the Web page, before navigating to a different Web page with the browser program;

(c) a per-image fetch latency, corresponding to a time period for fetching a specific image referenced in the Web page;

(d) an image arrival time, corresponding to a time at which a specific image, loaded as a part of rendering the Web page, arrives on the browser;

(e) a navigation status, corresponding to an event that brought the user to the Web page;

(f) a cache status, corresponding to a determination of whether the Web page was cached by the browser program or by a proxy;

(g) a window resize event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user resized a window in which the Web page is rendered;

(h) a page stop event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user aborted loading of the Web page;

(i) an image error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred while loading an image included in the Web page; and

(j) a JavaScript error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred during interpretation of JavaScript included in the Web page.

27. The memory medium of claim 23, wherein the at least one performance metric includes a performance metric for each image in the Web page.

28. A system for determining and collecting at least one performance metric related to access of a Web page by a browser program, the system comprising:

(a) a memory;

(b) a display;

(c) a network interface; and

(d) a processing device that is coupled to the memory, the display, and the network interface, the network interface being adapted to couple to a remote storage at a server to retrieve the Web page, the Web page including machine instructions that cause the processing device to;

detect whether a monitor cookie is included with the Web page, the monitor cookie indicating that the Web page is a monitored document;

perform, in response to the monitor cookie being detected, a browser monitoring function when the Web page is loaded by the processing device for rendering in the display, the browser monitoring function determining the at least one performance metric and being implemented without requiring any affirmative action by a user of the processing device and without using the browser monitoring function to request any further download from any site, the at least one performance metric being combined with another performance metric determined at the server to determine a correlated performance metric.

29. The system of claim 28, wherein the machine instructions further cause the processing device to transmit the at least one performance metric from the processing device to a remote site over a network through the network interface.

30. The system of claim 29, further comprising a computing device disposed remotely at a data center, the computing device receiving and analyzing the at least one performance metric to determine performance data for the Web page, the performance data including the correlated performance metric for the network.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein a determination of whether the at least one performance metric will be accepted for processing by the data center is based upon a probabilistic sampling parameter, ensuring that performance metrics transmitted to the data center are randomly sampled.

32. The system of claim 31, wherein the probabilistic sampling parameter is applied on a per-user basis to determine if the at least one performance metric is accepted for processing by the data center.

33. The system of claim 31, wherein the probabilistic sampling parameter is applied on a per-Web page basis to determine if the at least one performance metric will be accepted for processing by the data center.

34. The system of claim 30, wherein a plurality of different kinds of performance metrics can be determined by the browser monitoring function, and wherein the data center selectively accepts the at least one performance metric;

based upon a specific kind of performance metric that is being transmitted to it for processing.

35. The system of claim 30, further comprising:

(a) a server computing device that is remote from the processing device and coupled in communication with the processing device and with the data center over a network through the network interface, the server computing device executing a server monitoring function in regard to transferring the Web page to the processing device over the network;

(b) the server computing device determining a server performance metric related to the transfer of the Web page to the processing device from the server computing device; and

(c) the server computing device transmitting the server performance metric to the data center site for processing.

36. The system of claim 35, wherein the data center combines a performance metric determined by the browser monitoring function executed by the processing device with the server performance metric determined by the server computing function to determine the correlated performance metric.

37. The system of claim 35, further comprising a caching proxy disposed between the server computing device and the processing device, the caching proxy executing a caching proxy monitoring function that determines at least one performance metric related to a performance of the caching proxy.

38. The system of claim 28, wherein the at least one performance metric is determined by the processing device without providing any indication to a user of the processing device that the at least one performance metric is being determined.

39. The system of claim 28, wherein the at least one performance metric includes one or more of:

(a) a render latency, corresponding to a time period required to fetch and render all contents of the Web page on the display;

(b) a dwell latency, corresponding to a time period exhibited by a user viewing the Web page, before navigating to a different Web page;

(c) a per-image fetch latency, corresponding to a time period for fetching a specific image referenced in the Web page;

(d) an image arrival time, corresponding to a time at which a specific image, loaded as a part of rendering the Web page, arrives for rendering on the display;

(e) a navigation status, corresponding to an event that brought a user to the Web page;

(f) a cache status, corresponding to a determination of whether the Web page was cached in the memory by a browser program or by a proxy;

(g) a window resize event, corresponding to a determination of whether a user resized a window in which the Web page is rendered on the display;

(h) a page stop event, corresponding to a determination of whether a user aborted loading of the Web page;

(i) an image error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred while loading an image included in the Web page; and

(j) a JavaScript error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred during interpretation of JavaScript included in the Web page.

40. The system of claim 28, wherein the at least one performance metric comprises a performance metric for each image included in the Web page.

41. A method for determining and collecting at least one performance metric related to access of a Web page by a browser program on a client device, the method comprising:

(a) enabling a user to request transfer of the Web page from a server device to the client device over a network;

(b) transferring the Web page from the server device to the client device;

(c) including a monitor cookie with the Web page that indicates that the Web page is a monitored object;

(d) including machine instructions with the Web page so that the Web page and the machine instructions are transferred to the client device as one data file, the machine instructions performing a browser monitoring function when executed by the client device, the browser monitoring function being implemented in response to the monitor cookie being detected, without requiring any affirmative action by a user of the client devices, and without requesting any distributed application data from any site, the browser monitoring function determining at least one performance metric on the client device;

(e) determining a server performance metric; and

(f) combining the server performance metric with the at least one performance metric to determine a correlated performance metric for the network.

42. The method of claim 41, further comprising transmitting the at least one performance metric from the client device to a remote site over the network.

43. The method of claim 41, further comprising enabling a determination to be made of whether the at least one performance metric will be accepted for processing by a data center based upon a probabilistic sampling parameter.

44. The method of claim 41, wherein a plurality of different kinds of performance metrics can be determined by the browser monitoring function, further comprising enabling the data center to selectively accept a performance metric as a function of the kind of performance metric being transmitted to the data center.

45. The method of claim 41, wherein the at least one performance metric includes at least one of:

(a) a render latency, corresponding to a time period required to fetch and display all contents referenced within an Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) document on the client device;

(b) a dwell latency, corresponding to a time period exhibited by the user viewing the Web page, before navigating to a different Web page with the browser program;

(c) a per-image fetch latency, corresponding to a time period for fetching a specific image referenced in the Web page;

(d) an image arrival time, corresponding to a time at which a specific image, loaded as a part of rendering the Web page, arrives on the browser;

(e) a navigation status, corresponding to an event that brought the user to the Web page;

(f) a cache status, corresponding to a determination of whether the Web page was cached by the browser program or by a proxy;

(g) a window resize event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user resized a window in which the Web page is rendered;

(h) a page stop event, corresponding to a determination of whether the user aborted loading of the Web page;

(i) an image error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred while loading an image included in the Web page; and

(j) a JavaScript error event, corresponding to a determination of whether an error occurred during interpretation of JavaScript included in the Web page.

46. The method of claim 41, wherein the at least one performance metric comprises a performance metric for each image included in the Web page.

47. The method of claim 41, further comprising:

(a) executing a server monitoring function on the server device that is transferring the Web page to the client device;

(b) determining the server performance metric related to the transfer of the Web page to the client device from the server device with the server monitoring function; and

(c) transmitting the server performance metric to a remote site for combination with the at least one performance metric determined by the browser monitoring function on the client device, to determine the correlated performance of the network.