Randomization is a common practice with majority of the performance test scripts, where dropdown / Radio buttons / Links has to be chosen by the user randomly.
For example the application requires choosing a value from the drop down randomly, then the important thing is to know how many values are there in the drop down and what their values.
We all know the web_reg_save_param() or web_reg_save_param_ex() function has to be used to capture the values. Now, because we need all the values we'll specify the attribute "ORD=ALL" / "Ordinal=all". Assume that the function is written as below:
web_reg_save_param("DropdownValues", "Lb=<option>","rb=</option>", "Ord=all", LAST);
When the above function is executed, LoadRunner creates N+1 LR variables if there are N values in the drop down.
The first drop down value will be saved to an LR variable named "DropdownValues_1" and the second value from the drop down will be save to an LR variable named "DropdownValues_2" and so on. The total number of matches / count would be saved to another parameter called "DropdownValues_count".
The function used to choose a random value is lr_paramarr_random(). This function returns an address location of the random parameter.
In our example the function should be used as:
char * randVal;
randVal = lr_paramarr_random("DropdownValues");
As the variable randVal is C string variable, cannot be used in protocol functions, this has to be converted to an LR parameter using below statement (for details on why, please refer to variable conversion in LoadRunner).
lr_save_string(randVal, "RandDropdownVal");
When lr_paramarr_random("DropdownValues") is seen the script, the script immediately checks if there is a parameter named "DropdownValues_count" and tries to retrieve its value. If this parameter is not available, an error would be thrown.
Assuming that the count is 10, now it generates a random value between 1 - 10 and refers to the corresponding address location. i.e. if the random number is 6, it searches if there is an LR parameter called "DropdownValues_6", if yes, its address location is returned to the string variable.
If there is no such parameter, it would throw a warning saying that "The string with parameter delimiters is not a parameter"
Hence it is very important to capture all the values using the web_reg_save_param() function with the ORD attribute set to ALL if at all the parameter has to be used for randomization.
In the next article, we will see how we can utilize this behavior in building a custom C function that works similar to web_reg_save_param() with ORD being set to ALL.
For example the application requires choosing a value from the drop down randomly, then the important thing is to know how many values are there in the drop down and what their values.
We all know the web_reg_save_param() or web_reg_save_param_ex() function has to be used to capture the values. Now, because we need all the values we'll specify the attribute "ORD=ALL" / "Ordinal=all". Assume that the function is written as below:
web_reg_save_param("DropdownValues", "Lb=<option>","rb=</option>", "Ord=all", LAST);
When the above function is executed, LoadRunner creates N+1 LR variables if there are N values in the drop down.
The first drop down value will be saved to an LR variable named "DropdownValues_1" and the second value from the drop down will be save to an LR variable named "DropdownValues_2" and so on. The total number of matches / count would be saved to another parameter called "DropdownValues_count".
The function used to choose a random value is lr_paramarr_random(). This function returns an address location of the random parameter.
In our example the function should be used as:
char * randVal;
randVal = lr_paramarr_random("DropdownValues");
As the variable randVal is C string variable, cannot be used in protocol functions, this has to be converted to an LR parameter using below statement (for details on why, please refer to variable conversion in LoadRunner).
lr_save_string(randVal, "RandDropdownVal");
When lr_paramarr_random("DropdownValues") is seen the script, the script immediately checks if there is a parameter named "DropdownValues_count" and tries to retrieve its value. If this parameter is not available, an error would be thrown.
Assuming that the count is 10, now it generates a random value between 1 - 10 and refers to the corresponding address location. i.e. if the random number is 6, it searches if there is an LR parameter called "DropdownValues_6", if yes, its address location is returned to the string variable.
If there is no such parameter, it would throw a warning saying that "The string with parameter delimiters is not a parameter"
Hence it is very important to capture all the values using the web_reg_save_param() function with the ORD attribute set to ALL if at all the parameter has to be used for randomization.
In the next article, we will see how we can utilize this behavior in building a custom C function that works similar to web_reg_save_param() with ORD being set to ALL.
How can we capture the actual random value actually picked. If the count is 10 and a random value is selected between 1 and 10, how can that value be known.
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