|
|
Summary
eValid brings a fundamentally different
technology to the work of monitoring WebSites.
This page outlines how eValid technology compares
with alternative monitoring methods.
To make this clear we've related the three levels of monitoring
to a doctor's medical analysis of a patient.
(See also the Deviations from Realism
analysis of these alternatives.)
| Type | Medical Term and Meaning | Monitoring Method and Meaning | ||
| Alive | Body Temperature | Is the patient carrying a fever? Is the body temperature too low? | PING Test | Is server machine powered up and responding to ?
Most services -- many of them free -- call this "Availability Monitoring" |
| Responding | Heart Rate (Taking Your Pulse) | Is the patient's heart pumping too fast or too slow? Is the heart beat strong or weak? | HTTP Test | Is the server machine delivering pages at all?
Many services call this
"Performance Monitoring",
or "Transaction Monitoring",
when there is a sequence of HTTP/S retrievals involved.
|
| Coherent | Mental Alertness | Ask the patient a question to know if he/she is OK? | eValid Rich Internet Application Test | Is the e-commerce application
actually responding normally, coherently?
No other services have this. Only monitoring services that use eValid have this capability. |
Monitoring Methods Expanded
The three monitoring methods,
like the three levels of medical checks a doctor performs,
provide varying kinds of information.
All are necessary; but some are more sophisticated than others.
(See the Technology
Level Comparison diagram.)
| Test Type. | How It's Done | What's It Cost? | What Protection Does It Provide? |
| PING Test | A ping test is usually done with the ping IP-Address or ping domain-name command. Normally the ping is done periodically, say every five minutes, to make sure that your server is responding. | PING tests are often free, or very low cost. Usually ping tests focus just on the top-most page, i.e. www.mysite.com/index.html. | If your website is off the air -- not responding at all -- a ping test will show this clearly! If your website can't be pinged, it can't serve pages via HTTP and can't handle any e-commerce transactions. |
| HTTP Test | An HTTP test is normally done using a scripting language such as PERL, or with a special program that implements the HTTP protocol. | HTTP tests are also low cost, but because there is more to do there usually is a monthly charge. | You know that your server is "delivering pages" successfully. If the HTTP sequence is chosen carefully you can get a good idea of whether your site is working the way you want. |
| Rich Internet Application (RIA) Test | A rich internet application test requires using the eValid browser to play back a realistic sequence of user actions, and then observe and validate if the server is delivering correct responses. | Rich internet application tests cost more because they require more resources and take more time on the monitoring machine's I/O channel. Pricing is based on the length of the test, the frequency of the test, and the number of test points from which you want to provide application test confirmation. | Rich internet application testing provides the best possible
guarantee that your e-commerce application is
performing realiably, correctly, and within
performance parameters.
|
