I have a tcp-based application and would like to do load testing for it, I have narrowed down on JMeter TCP Sample and Clif, for now i am leaning towards JMeter because it easier to use, Clif seems to be more complicated and less used.
Any thoughts?
Has anyone used some 3rd tool?
Does anyone have an opinion/experience with getting Clif to work?
We would mostly be looking for open source options so any help in that direction would be extremely useful.
Usually in work I use LoadRunner and JMeter. If LoadRunner is able to create test then it's a fast way. JMeter is much more flexible, because you could write your own plugins or simply implementation of JavaSamplerClient interface. I don't know many posibilities of JMeter, but with java language can perform different tasks. LoadRunner has big weight, rare updates and terrible price.
All of the commercial tools support Windows sockets interface support, up to the ability to record the actual conversation (Loadrunner, SilkPerformer, Rational Performance Tester). Winsock has been a part of these large commercial tools since the mid-late 1990's. All of the above tools offer engagement based models as well, for periods as short as a month. I would suggest contacting the sales organizations for HP, Microfocus and Borland to see what they can offer.
Compared to hand constructing sockets code and then having to engineer the reporting side you may save time and labor hours in the rental of one of the big commercial tools which already sports the dedicated sockets interface combined with the system monitoring and reporting that you need.
