freeloader

Just a super easy load-testing framework.

no complex GUI to get lost in
load tests == code, and yes you should check them in :)
easy to plug-in to your CI server
get started in seconds

Getting started

Freeloader uses 4 basic keywords:

request to create an HTTP request using unirest
emit to push the request down the pipeline
send to make the actual HTTP call
join to join 2 streams together

The simplest test looks like:

require('freeloader').global();

// See unirest documentation for all the options (headers, file uploads...)
var r = request.get('http://localhost:3000/hello')
               .header('Accept', 'application/json');

emit(r).pipe(send());

That's it! This test sends a single HTTP request, and finishes straight away. In general, test suites automatically end:

when every request has been sent
or when you press Ctrl-C
or when a module adds its own stopping condition

Building a pipeline

It becomes a lot more interesting when we build a pipeline.

Each step in the pipeline has access to all requests & responses. They can modify payloads, generate more requests, or collect data for reporting.

freeloader-bundle contains a lot of useful modules to get started. Each module is an instance of a Node.js stream, and you can also easily create your own.

require('freeloader').global();
require('freeloader-bundle').global();

var r = request.get('http://localhost:3000/hello')
               .header('Accept', 'application/json');

emit(r)
.pipe(concurrent(50))
.pipe(stopTimer('30s'))
.pipe(requestDots())
.pipe(responseDots())
.pipe(consoleSummary())
.pipe(consoleCharts())
.pipe(send())

Which outputs something like:

CI or unit tests

Test pipelines can easily be included in a CI test suite:

it('generates load test reports', function(done) {
  emit(r1)
  .pipe(times(50))
  .pipe(jsonSummary('./report.json'))
  .pipe(callback(done))
  .pipe(send());
});

Joining streams

Streams can also be joined for more complex scenarios.

Emit 2 different requests with a concurrency of 50 each

join(emit(r1), emit(r2))
.pipe(concurrent(50))
.pipe(summary())
.pipe(send());

It's up to each reporter to either give global stats, or group the report by request URL.

Complex requests

The request object is a unirest object, which means you can configure it to set HTTP headers, custom payloads, SSL certificates, etc...