Ingenieurbüro David Fischer AG | A Company of the Apica Group
www.proxy-sniffer.com
Pure Cloud – Run all
components of the
Apica ProxySniffer
product completely in
the cloud.
© 2012 Ingenieurbüro David Fischer AG
Last Revised: January 10, 2013
All Rights Reserved
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Introduction of Apica ProxySniffer "Pure Cloud"
Our "Pure Cloud" architecture allows you to run all components of the Apica
ProxySniffer product completely in the Amazon cloud. No local resources are needed to
execute large scale load tests.
You can instantly use pre-installed and tuned virtual machines in the Amazon cloud for
all tasks requiring the execution of realistic and large scale Web load and stress tests.
 See last pages in this document to learn more about facts, restrictions and benefits.
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First Step: Creating a Cloud-Based Data Disk
First Step: Create a cloudbased Data Disk.
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Data Disk creation: Enter as volume description
your project name or any arbitrary text.
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New cloud-based data disk
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Second Step: Starting a Personal, Virtual Machine with Attached Data-Disk
Second Step: start a
personal, virtual machine
with a selected data disk.
If you have created several
data disks you can select
the disk to be attached to
the virtual machine.
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Enter an arbitrary password for
the PrxUser account. You can
enter any value, but without
space, semicolon and quote
characters.
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The data disk changes its state
from "available" to "in-use"
DNS-Name of the virtual machine, status = "running"
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After a virtual machine has been started you can access it in three ways:
1. Via your Web browser. Remote access to the Proxy Sniffer Web Admin GUI:
http://<ec2-hostname>:7990
2. Via WebDAV for uploading and download files to the data disk:
http://<ec2-hostname>:81/MyTests/
3. Via Remote Desktop (this is the normal way). Note: Mac OS X users can
download Remote Desktop for MAC from Microsoft for free.
The access to these three network services is protected by the same user name and
password. The user name is always PrxUser and the password is the one that you
have entered when starting (launching) the virtual machine.
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1) Remote Web Access – Proxy Sniffer GUI
DNS-Name of the virtual machine
Login always with the account PrxUser. Use the same
password that you have entered when starting the
virtual machine.
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Attached cloud-based Data Disk
Note: you can use the
and
icons to upload and download files.
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2) Accessing the WebDAV Data Disk "/MyTests" (Mac OS X Example)
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DNS-Name of the virtual machine
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Login always with the account PrxUser. Use the same
password that you have entered when starting the
virtual machine.
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Attached cloud-based Data Disk
Upload a file from the local desktop to the remote WebDAV disk
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3) Remote Desktop Login on the personal, Virtual Machine
DNS-Name of the virtual machine
Login always with the account PrxUser. Use the same
password that you have entered when starting the
virtual machine.
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Mac OS X Example
Login always with the account PrxUser. Use the same
password that you have entered when starting the
virtual machine.
Do not use a Domain (clear this input field)
DNS-Name of the virtual machine
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Remote Desktop of Virtual Machine
Calling the Proxy Sniffer GUI
Proxy Sniffer started as Windows Service: 64-Bit – with 4 GB of Java-Memory
Pre-installed Firefox
Recording Add-On
Attached cloudbased data disk
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Note: you can also upload and download files via Remote Desktop
Attached cloud-based data disk
Disk on your local computer
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Terminating a Virtual Machine
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Click repeatedly on the
Refresh-Icon until you see that
the instance has changed its
state to "terminated".
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The data disk changes its state
from "in-use" to "available"
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Starting another Virtual Machine by using the Same Data Disk
Start a new virtual machine
with same (old) data disk.
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New DNS name of new virtual machine
Attached (old) cloud-based Data Disk
Intact data, created by using the
terminated, old virtual machine.
FAQ
Q: Why separate Data Disks in the cloud from virtual machines?
A: Because of the costs. Using one virtual machine costs you between 1.14 and 1.60 USD per hour, but
renting one cloud-based data disk (10 GB) cost you only between 1.00 and 1.90 USD (+ I/O) per month.
Normally you use virtual machines only during a few days per months, but you want keep your data for a
longer time.
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Facts:
- Create a new cloud-based Data Disk: 30 Seconds
- Start a new Virtual Machine: 4 Minutes
- No subscription for the GUI AMIs required, only the Amazon basic costs are
charged
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Restrictions:
- Data Disk and Virtual Machine must run in the same Amazon data center
- One Data Disk can only be attached to one Virtual Machine concurrently
- Currently no HTTPS access is available for the Web GUI and for the WebDAV
service (only unencrypted HTTP connections are supported). However, "Remote
Desktop" allows you to establish encrypted connections, and you can also disable
the Web GUI and the WebDAV service
- The Virtual Machines currently only run on Windows OS. However, MS "Remote
Desktop" software is available for Mac OS X for free (download from MS).
- Access to a Data Disk is only possible in combination with a running Virtual
Machine (no access to Data-Disks when no Virtual Machine is started)
- No multiuser support. One Virtual Machine can be used only by one person at
the same time
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Benefits:
- No installation effort: ready-to-use in few minutes, easy and fast. All preconfigured virtual machines are optimally tuned.
- All Data Disks can be operated independently from starting and stopping Virtual
Machines
- No need to rent or purchase any hardware for performing your large load tests
- Low costs if you are using the Virtual Machines only for a short time.
Pricing: 1.14 .. 1.60 USD ¹ per hour per Virtual Machine + network traffic
- Multiple Data Disks can be created and can be used in multiple projects
- Excellent network connections to the cloud-based Load Generators. Especially
useful if you start large load tests with more than 5 cloud-based Load Generators.
- Very low costs for storing all of your test data permanently in the cloud
(1.00 .. 1.90 USD ¹ per month and data disk + I/O)
¹ = prices are subject to change without notice and do not include taxes or fees unless stated
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Cloud-based Load Generators:
In order that you can perform large load tests by simulating up to 1,000,000 Web
users you have additionally to rent cloud-based load generators per hour or per
week. See also www.proxy-sniffer.com/ec2-pricing
The rented cloud-based load generators can be run and managed in any data center,
independently in which data center the Virtual Machine has been started.
The locally available Load Generator on the Virtual Machine allows you to run small
load tests with up 20 VU in order that you can verify your load tests before renting
the cloud-based Load Generators.
Important Note: when using virtual machines for the GUI,
cloud based load generators should always be launched from the Virtual Machine
(not from the Proxy Sniffer installation on your local machine).
The documentation about cloud-based load generators is available at
http://www.proxy-sniffer.com/en/doc/GeneratingLoadFromTheCloudEN.pdf
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Supplementary Notes for Operating
Before delivering the final release of "Pure Cloud" we have detected during internal tests, that sometimes a GUI instance
cannot be launched in a particular "Availability Zone" of a data center. In such a case you will see the following, similar
error message:
For this reason you can select the "Availability Zone" of the data center when creating a new volume (Data Disk):
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If you see such an error as mentioned before, you should delete your volume and then create again a new volume in the
same data center, but by choosing another "Availability Zone" than before. After that the new GUI instance can be
successfully launched.
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