TestEngineering/Performance/Talos/Misc

Adding a new test

[TODO] move to TestEngineering/Performance/Talos/Adding tests

Adding a new performance test or modifying an existing test is much easier than most people think. In general, we need to create a patch for talos which has:

• determine if this is a startup test or a page load test and create the appropriate folder for your test in talos
• add all files and resources for the test (make sure there is no external network accesses) to that folder
• file a bug in the testing:talos component with your patch

What we need to know about tests

When adding a new test, we really need to understand what we are doing. Here are some questions that you should know the answer to before adding a new test:

• What does this test measure?
• Does this test overlap with any existing test?
• What is the unit of measurement that we are recording?
• What would constitute a regression?
• What is the expected range in the results over time?
• Are there variables or conditions which would affect this test?
  • browser configuration (prefs, environment variables)?
  • OS, resources, time of day, etc... ?
• Indepenedent of Observation? Will this test produce the same number regardless of what was run before it?
• What considerations are there for how this test should be run and what tools are required?

Please document the answers to these questions on TestEngineering/Performance/Talos/Tests.

Making a Pageloader test work

A pageloader test is the most common. Using the pageloader extension allows for most of the reporting and talos integration to be done for you. Here is what you need to do:

• Create a new directory in the tests subdirectory of talos
• Create a manifest
  • add a <testname>.manifest file in your directory (svg example)
    • raw page load will just be a single url line (svg example)
    • internal measurements will have a % prior to the url (svg example)
• Add your tests
  • for self reporting tests, use [tpRecordTime]
    • tsvgx example - single page/value
    • tart example - multiple pages/values
• Add your test definition to talos via [test.py] to add a new class for your test. ([tscrollx example])
  • Add an item for tpmanifest, ${talos} is replaced with the current running directory.
    • example: tpmanifest = '${talos}/tests/scroll/scroll.manifest'
  • Add an item for tpcycles (we recommend 1) and tppagecycles (we recommend 25 for a simple page, and 5 for a internal recording benchmark)
  • Add an item for filters. ([tcanvasmark example])

Making a Startup test work

A startup test is designed to load the browser with a single page many times. This is useful for tests which shouldn't have any extensions, can handle all loading and measuring themselves, or require the measurement of the browser startup. Here is what you need to do:

• Create a new directory in the startup_test subdirectory of talos
• Add your tests to the folder, these will be accessed by a raw URL
  • the tests need to report [__start_report<value>__end_report] so talos will find it ([tspaint example])
  • if you plan on doing shutdown times, you need to add in [__startTimestamp<value>__endTimestamp]. ([tspaint example])
  • Include [MozillaFileLogger.js] and [quit.js] in your script ([tspaint example])
• Add your test definition to talos via [test.py] to add a new class for your test. ([tresize example])
  • Add an item for cycles, we recommend 20.
  • Add an item for url, this is relative to the talos directory and what Firefox will load
  • Add tpmozafterpaint and set it to 'True' by default, or 'False' if your test does other internal measurements unrelated to rendering a page
  • Add an item for filters. ([tresize example])

Steps to add a test to production

• [File a bug] to add tests to [talos] [example].

• for aurora/central on desktop only - just land your new test to your in-tree commit (on inbound/autoland) and ensure that you adjust talos.json to run the test.
  • NOTE: one exception is adding an entirely new suite- this requires a [buildbot] patch to add the new scheduled job. Example: [Bug 886288 - deploy new tsvgx and tscrollx talos tests to m-c only]
  • if you add a new suite, edit talos.yml to add the testname to a new suite, then add it to test-sets.yml for all the different talos test-sets.

• Update talos
  • just land code in-tree (inbound/autoland)

• Ensure the test follows the branch through the [release stages]
  • if we are just updating talos.json, this will be automatic

• if this is an update to an existing test that could change the numbers, this needs to be treated as a new test and run side by side for a week to get a new baseline for the numbers.

• document the test on TestEngineering/Performance/Talos/Tests
  • NOTE: this should be updated every time the branch moves closer to release. Once on release we don't need to update

While that is a laundry list of items to do, if you are developer of a component just talk to the a*team ([jmaher]) and they will handle the majority of the steps above.

Background Information

Hardware Profile of machines used in automation

Note: Moved to TestEngineering/Performance/Talos/Platforms

Naming convention

't' is pre-pended to the names to represent 'test'. Thus, ts = 'test startup', tp = 'test pageload', tdhtml = 'test dhtml'.