What is a Test Plan?

A Test Plan can be viewed as a container for running tests. It defines what to test and how to go about it. A complete test plan consists of one or more elements such as thread groups, logic controllers, sample-generating controllers, listeners, timers, assertions, and configuration elements. A test plan must have at least one thread group.

Writing a Test Plan

Follow the steps given below to write a test plan −

Step 1: Start the JMeter Window

Open the JMeter window by clicking /home/manisha/apache-jmeter-2.9/bin/jmeter.sh. The JMeter window will appear as below −

This is a plain and blank JMeter window without any additional elements added to it. It contains two nodes −

• Test Plan node − is where the real test plan is kept.

• Workbench node − It simply provides a place to temporarily store test elements while not in use, for copy/paste purposes. When you save your test plan, Workbench items are not saved with it.

Step 2: Add/Remove Elements

Elements (which will be discussed in the next chapter Test Plan Elements) can be added to a test plan by right-clicking on the Test Plan node and choosing a new element from the “add” list.

Alternatively, you can load an element from a file and add it by choosing the “merge” or “open” option.

For example, let us add a Thread Group element to a Test Plan as shown below −

To remove an element, make sure the element is selected, right-click on the element, and choose the “remove” option.

Step 3: Load and Save the Elements

To load an element from file −

• Right-click on the existing tree element to which you want to add the loaded element.
• Select Merge.
• Choose the file where you saved the elements.
• JMeter will merge the elements into the tree.

By default, JMeter does not save the element, you need to explicitly save it.

To save tree elements −

• Right-click on the element.
• Choose the Save Selection As … option.

JMeter will save the element selected, plus all the child elements beneath it. By default, JMeter doesn”t save the elements, you need to explicitly save it as mentioned earlier.

Step 4: Configuring the Tree Elements

Any element in the Test Plan can be configured using the controls present in JMeter”s right-hand side frame. These controls allow you to configure the behavior of that particular test element. For example, the Thread Group can be configured for a number of users, ramp up periods, etc., as shown below −

Step 5: Saving the Test Plan

You can save an entire Test Plan by using either Save or “Save Test Plan As …” from the File menu.

Step 6: Run the Test Plan

You can run the Test Plan by clicking Start(Control + r) from the Run menu item. When JMeter starts running, it shows a small green box at the right-hand end of the section just under the menubar.

The numbers to the left of the green box are the number of active threads / total number of threads. These only apply to a locally run test; they do not include any threads started on remote systems when using client-server mode.

Step 7: Stop the Test Plan

You can stop your test in two ways −

• Using Stop (Control + ”.”). It stops the threads immediately if possible.

• Using Shutdown (Control + ”,”). It requests the threads to stop at the end of any current work.