At The Core

At the heart of Computaris TOP Testing Suite is JMeter an open source Java-based testing framework providing the logic for defining, managing and handling test plans. Various plug-ins enable testing a full range of standard Telecom protocols. Other protocols can be added as required. All systems under test can be automatically and dynamically tested as black boxes using a convenient graphical user interface enabling operators to work out any test scenario, varying from very simple to most complex.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

Testing A Telecom Framework

TOP Testing Suite is a suite of testing tools providing operators enhanced capabilities to comprehensively test end-to-end telecom services. The suite can be used to thoroughly test the communication path between originating and terminating mobile devices all the way down to the subscriber databases of a Telecom operator. TOP Testing Suite can simulate CORBA network traffic originating from for example Billing & Charging systems, Diameter traffic originating from Service Control Points and CAMEL messages from Mobile Switching Centers. This video will show you how to apply CORBA and Diameter samplers for testing a billing and charging server, a subscription manager, a rating engine, an account manager and an offline billing server.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

Test Plan - Flow Chart DEMO

The test plan works out a prepaid and a postpaid scenario using CORBA and Diameter samplers. First the subscriber IMSI is fetched from the CSV file. Based on the received IMSI number subscriber information is fetched from the subscription manager. For a prepaid subscriber a rate event is issued to the rating engine to fetch the subscribers initial balance from the account manager. To check whether the balance is sufficiently high for using the requested service a Diameter session with the online billing and charging server is set up. As a last step of the prepaid scenario the subscribers final balance is fetched from the account manager. For a postpaid subscriber the postpaid scenario will be executed in which the offline billing server will be updated with a call detail record. Finally a brief status report will be written to an output file.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

Variables & Configuration Elements

The two main elements in the main window of TOP Testing Suite are the test plan and the workbench. The test plan contains the test scenario in the form of a multi-level tree of child test elements. The workbench can be used to temporarily store and quickly access any of the test elements. On test plan level user defined variables can be used. The default values can be entered manually to be reused by elements elsewhere in the test plan. The CORBA configuration element contains reference information about the CORBA server under test and is contained in four IDL files defining the account manager, the billing server, the rating engine and the subscription manager. IDL files can simply be added by clicking the file open icon. For the configuration of the Diameter plug-in three values are important: the hostname or IP address of the Diameter peer server under test, its port number, and the local port number. Additional tabs allow the further configuration of the Diameter protocol messages such as the capability exchange and disconnect peer request messages. A counter element is used for serving the Diameter protocol and its variable name will be used further on in the test plan for calculation of the Diameter session IDs. The last configuration element defines the name of the external CSV data file, the internal variable names TOP uses for containing the data, and the type of delimiter used for separating the data.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

The Test Tree

The prepaid test scenario is handled by multiple CORBA, Diameter and dummy samplers, starting with a CORBA sampler for emulating rate events. A dummy sampler is used to generate time delays. Another CORBA sampler fetches the initial balance from the account manager; another dummy sampler prepares the Diameter session IDs. From the two Diameter samplers in the test plan the first one is used for interrogating the online billing and charging server; the second one returns termination messages with or without used service unit depending on the result of the interrogation. Another CORBA sampler fetches the subscribers final balance from the account manager; the prepaid results are stored using Javascript. For the postpaid scenario a CORBA sampler writes a call data record to the offline billing server; and the postpaid status results stored again using Javascript. At the end of the test plan Javascript writes all prepaid and postscript results to an output text file. To collect and gather the test results 6 listeners conclude the test plan.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

CORBA & Diameter Samplers

A CORBA sampler can be simply added by choosing it from the context menu. Configuration is intuitive and straightforward. Only a CORBA server reference, and an IDL file are needed; in this case the IDL file describing the CORBA interface of the rating engine is selected. After choosing the IDL file the module, the interface and the method can be selected. The values of the parameters of the CORBA method can be manually entered or be taken from a user defined variable. The result of the CORBA method can be stored in a variable; here we store the price to be used further on in the test plan. Adding a Diameter sampler is done in a similar way as for the CORBA sampler. Configuration starts by giving a name to the Diameter sampler followed by the type of messages to be exchanged. This sampler is configured for issuing credit control requests to the online billing and charging server. New attribute value pairs can be easily added as children or siblings by choosing from a wide range of predefined and preconfigured AVPs. Just as for the CORBA sampler the result of the Diameter sampler is also stored in a variable for further usage within the thread group.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

Test Run in Simulator Environment

With the number of threads set to five, choosing start from the run menu triggers the execution of the test plan. The test results are immediately displayed in the test environment simulator. The generated test results can also be monitored online from any of the listeners. Here we choose to view the results from the CORBA Results Table listener. The simulator shows the successive results generated by the CORBA and Diameter samplers as received from the subscription manager, the rating engine, the account manager and the online and offline billing and charging servers. Consulting the listeners we can view details about all performed CORBA and Diameter message exchanges.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

Listeners & Output File

TOP Testing Suite provides various types of listeners which can be used for gathering information during a test run. Depending on your needs you can choose the appropriate set of listeners which allows you to view the test results in several formats. For this demonstration we have used six listeners. The CORBA results table listener displays all CORBA results in tabular format. The view results tree listener presents the collected information as a chronological tree; three tabs provide further details and the results can be viewed in several formats. Two other listeners provide statistical data about the message exchanges. The Diameter Messages listener shows the contents of all Diameter message exchanges; attribute value pairs reveal the contents of all exchanged Diameter request and answer messages. The sixth and last listener shows an alternative view on the Diameter results displaying message contents conveniently on separate tabs. And finally the results of the test run are written to an external text file showing the status results of the five threads.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text

Conclusion
TOP Testing Suites key features are its scalability, extensibility and usability. Its technical features make it a robust, costeffective, convenient and user friendly telecom testing solution that can be deployed at any stage of the product development and deployment process. Computaris TOP Testing Suite shifts control to the operator making it a beneficial tool for the CSP community.

Computaris TOP Testing Suite Quick Demonstration Video v1.0 Narration Text