How we did it

Performance monitoring platforms that can keep your site in balance.

By GARRETT MICHAEL HAYES
Network World, 11/06/00

We set up a small Windows-based network that performed basic Web commerce functions. Microsoft's Internet Information Server Version 4, combined with Site Server 3.0 E-commerce Edition, provided Web service on a Hewlett-Packard Kayak system running Windows NT 4.0 Server, Service Pack 6a. Domain control services, Exchange 2000 and a SQL Server 7.0 database back end for the Web site were hosted on an IBM Netfinity 5500 running Windows 2000 with Service Pack 1.

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Each product tested was installed on an IBM Netfinity 5500 running NT 4.0 Server, Service Pack 6a. Finally, a dozen PC clients each ran multiple sessions of Internet Explorer, retrieving a series of three Web pages with database queries from the target Web server.

After installing each package, we configured the product to monitor our basic Web site and related services, send e-mail alerts or take other appropriate actions, and generally explore what the product would allow us to do. We then simulated various failures, from unplugging network cables to shutting down needed NT services, to observe what the products did in such circumstances.

The goal of the testing was to examine the features of each package rather than to conduct stress or performance testing. Toward this end, we intentionally used systems that, by present standards, would be considered underpowered for the tasks to which we put them, if they were in a realistic environment. This let us create observable variations in the behavior of the tested systems using smaller changes in the environment than would be required in the real world. It is important to understand that no performance metrics were applied during our tests and absolutely no inferences should be drawn about the products tested in terms of suitability with the hardware we provided.