upload same file with different name each time in Load Runner - file-upload

I need to upload an excel file in load runner HTTP/HTML script with unique filename each time. The file must present in the directory. Copying files and renaming them will be more manual task. Can anyone tell me is there any automated way to do this? or Load Runnner itself can perform such tasks? Thank you.

On each of your load generators make sure that you have a ram drive for the file i/o for the new files. You are going to have ten, perhaps hundreds or thousands on your load generator. You do not want contention for the read/write heads of a physical hard drive acting as a drag anchor on the performance of your entire load generator. It is for this same reason that logging is minimized during test execution.
Include the base file as part of your virtual user
Use appropriate language API for making a copy of the file from the virtual user directory to the ramdrive on your virtual user generator with a new name. It might recommend a name which includes virtual user number and iteration number at the end to ensure uniqueness across your virtual user population.
Upload your file from the ramdrive as the source
Delete your newly created file to return to the same initial condition as the beginning of the iteration.
As you will be engaging a large amount of file i/o for the virtual users it is highly recommended that you monitor the load generators just as you would monitor your application under test. If you are new to LoadRunner and performance testing then this is an excellent opportunity for your mentor/trainer to guide you on a monitoring strategy.

Assuming the upload is done using a html form..
Use web_submit_data() with the FilePath argument.
but first lets create some parameters to get a real unique filename (very importent)
create a parameter VUSERID which outputs the current vuser id.
get/save the current timestamp
web_save_timestamp_param("TIMESTAMP", LAST);
and here is the request:
web_submit_data("i1",
"Action=https://{LR_SERVER}/{LR_JUNCTION}/upload",
"Method=POST",
"EncType=multipart/form-data",
"Snapshot=t1.inf",
"Mode=HTML",
ITEMDATA,
"Name=FIELDNAME", "Value={VUSERID}{TIMESTAMP}_LOADTEST.xlsx", "File=yes", "FilePath=REALFILEPATH.xlsx", "ContentType=WHATEVERCONTENTTYPE", ENDITEM,
LAST);
The Value={VUSERID}{TIMESTAMP}_LOADTEST.xlsx will be the new (unique) filename. (It is unique for each user and iteration! very importent)
The FilePath points to the real file and its content will be uploaded.

Related

How to make the uploaded file available for use after saving it with GetRandomFileName according to the FileHelpers example?

In the documentation sample code for how to deal with user uploaded files, they save it as a trusted filename for filestorage via GetRandomFileName, and a trusted filename for HTML display.
In the comments it says: "In most production scenarios, an anti-virus/anti-malware scanner API is used on the file before making the file available for download or for use by other systems."
Is that going to be before it is saved with a random filename or after? Because that is the point of saving it as a random filename, so that it doesn't get executed? And when the scanning is done, how is the file going to be made available? I guess the file just has to be renamed if it passes the scan or else deleted? If so, what is the proper way to get the original file extenstion? And do you know of any good scanners that are gratis that are popular to use?
I try to learn web development. Thanks for your time and help.
The renaming of the file here has nothing to do with the anti-virus protection. The files don't tend to execute themselves whatever their name is. Same with the virus scan: it's not for the server protection, it's for the users protection. If your server executes the binary it gets from the client, it's a security breach regardless of whether it's a virus or not.
The renaming here is probably done just to be able to store the duplicates. That being said, in the production scenarios you'll probably never store the incoming files as physical files on the FS. They usually go to the DB as blobs, so the name is not an issue.
This is just a sample app designed to teach how to work with binary streams and file controllers. Don't expect too much from it in terms of applicability to the real solutions.

Executing Abaqus Model in Taverna

I'm pretty new to both Taverna and Abaqus but I am trying to run an Abaqus model using a "Tool" in Taverna remotely on a HPC. This works fine if I already have my model file and inputs on the HPC but I need a way of uploading the files dynamically in Taverna (trying to generically wrap Abaqus models).
I've tried adding a input port that takes a file list but I don't know how I can copy it to the "location" that I've set for the tool. Could a beanshell service be the answer or can I iterate through the file list and copy them up before executing the abaqus model?
Thanks
When you say that you created an input port that takes a file list, I guess you mean an input to the tool service.
Assuming the input port is called my_file_list, when the tool service is run, it will take a list of data values on port my_file_list. As an example, say it has "hello", "hi" and "hola" is the three values in the list.
On the location where the tool service is run, it executes in a temporary directory - a different directory for each execution of the service. It is normally something like /tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696
Three files will be created in the temporary directory; those files contain the (in this example) three values the tool service received on port my_file_list. The files could be called
/tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696/tempfile.0.tmp containing hello
/tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696/tempfile.1.tmp containing hi
/tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696/tempfile.2.tmp containing hola
There will also be a file called my_input_list. That file will contain
/tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696/tempfile.0.tmp
/tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696/tempfile.1.tmp
/tmp/usecase-2029778474741087696/tempfile.2.tmp
The script of your tool service would normally read the contents of my_input_list line by line and do something with the contents of the listed file(s).
I have also seen some scripts that 'cheat' and iterate directly over tempfile*.tmp but that would be "a bad thing". The problem with that trick, is that if you want to add a second list of files to the tool service then the file my_input_list could contain
/tmp/usecase7932018053449784034/tempfile.4.tmp
/tmp/usecase7932018053449784034/tempfile.5.tmp
/tmp/usecase7932018053449784034/tempfile.6.tmp
as other temporary files were used for the other file list port.
I hope that helps
The tool service allows you to upload files - but if you are using the HPC through a job submission node, then you would have to modify your command line tool to then use the job file staging command to further push the files as part of the job. The files would be available in the current (temporary) directory of the specified tool script.
I would try to do it through the Tool service and not involve the beanshell - then you can keep your workflow simpler.
A good thing to remember is that you can write multiple shell commands in the box.
Similarly you would probably want to retrieve back the results so that you can process them further in the workflow (unless they are massive - in which case you should just output their remote filenames and send them in again to the next HPC job)
The exact commands to use for staging files and retrieving them depends on the HPC job submission system. Which one are you using?
Thanks for the input guys.
It was my misunderstanding of how Taverna uses the File list. All the files in the list are copied to the temp "sandbox" and are therefore available for use.
Another nice easy way is to zip the directory and pass the zipped files into an input port for the service. Then just unzip the files inside the command.
Thanks again

Storing uploaded content on a website

For the past 5 years, my typical solution for storing uploaded files (images, videos, documents, etc) was to throw everything into an "upload" folder and give it a unique name.
I'm looking to refine my methods for storing uploaded content and I'm just wondering what other methods are used / preferred.
I've considered storing each item in their own folder (folder name is the Id in the db) so I can preserve the uploaded file name. I've also considered uploading all media to a locked folder, then using a file handler, which you pass the Id of the file you want to download in the querystring, it would then read the file and send the bytes to the user. This is handy for checking access, and restricting bandwidth for users.
I think the file handler method is a good way to handle files, as long as you know to how make good use of resources on your platform of choice. It is possible to do stupid things like read a 1GB file into memory if you don't know what you are doing.
In terms of storing the files on disk it is a question of how many, what are the access patterns, and what OS/platform you are using. For some people it can even be advantageous to store files in a database.
Creating a separate directory per upload seems like overkill unless you are doing some type of versioning. My personal preference is to rename files that are uploaded and store the original name. When a user downloads I attach the original name again.
Consider a virtual file system such as SolFS. Here's how it can solve your task:
If you have returning visitors, you can have a separate container for each visitors (and name it by visitor login, for example). One of the benefits of this approach is that you can encrypt the container using visitor's password.
If you have many probably one-time visitors, you can have one or several containers with files grouped by date of upload.
Virtual file system lets you keep original filenames either as actual filesnames, or as a metadata for the files being stored.
Next, you can compress the data being stored in the container.

How do i force a file to be deleted? Windows server 2008

On my site a user may upload a file (pic, zip, audio, video, whatever). He then may decide to replace it with a newer revision. This user may upload a file, make a post then decide to put up a new revision replacing the old (lets say its a large zip or tar.gz file). Theres a good chance people may be downloading it if he sent out an email or even im for the home user.
Problem. I need to replace the file and people may be downloading and it may be some minutes before it is deleted. I dont want my code to stall until i cant delete or check every second to see if its unused (especially bad if another user can start and he takes long creating a cycle).
How do i delete the file while users are downloading the file? i dont care if they stop i just care that the file can be replaced and new downloads are the new revision.
What about referencing the files indirectly?
A mapping script, maps a virtual file entry from your site to a real file . If the user wants to upload a new revision of his file you just update the mapping, not the real file.
You can install a daily task that scans all files and deletes all files without a mapping and without open connections.
lajuette's answer is right, the easiest solution is to work around the file locking altogether:
When a user uploads file foo.zip, internally store it as foo-v1.zip.
Create a mapping file somewhere (database, code, whatever) that maps foo.zip to foo-v1.zip.
Rather than exposing a direct link to the file, expose a link to a service that gets the file: mysite.com/Download?foo.zip or something. This service uses the mapping to determine which version of the file to send to the client.
When a new version is uploaded, create foo-v2.zip and update the mapping file.
It wouldn't be that hard to write a scheduled task that cleans up old, un-mapped files.
If your oppose to a database and If the filenames are in a fix format (such as user/id.ext) you could append the id with a revision number and enumerate the folder using a pattern (user/id-*) and use the latest revision.

Vb.Net Document Storage

I am attempting to add a document storage module to our AR software.
I will be prompting the user to attach a doc/image to thier account. I will then put a copy of this file into our folder so that we can reference it without having to rely on them keeping the file in its original place. This system is not using a database but instead its using multiple flat files.
I am looking for guidance on how to handle these files once they have attached them to our system.
How should I store these attached files?
I was thinking I could copy the file over to a sub directory then renaming it to a auto-generated number so that we do not have duplicates. The bad thing about this, is the contents of the folder can get rather large.
Anyone have a better way? Should I create directories and store them...?
This system is not using a database but instead its using multiple flat files.
This sounds like a multi-user system. How are you handing concurrent access issues? Your answer to that will greatly influence anything we tell you here.
Since you aren't doing anything special with your other files to handle concurrent access, what I would do is add a new folder under your main data folder specifically for document storage, and write your user files there. Additionally, you need to worry about name collisions. To handle that, I'd name each file there with by appending the date and username to the original file name and taking the md5 or sha1 hash of that string. Then add a file to your other data files to map the hash values to original file names for users.
Given your constraints (and assuming a limited number of total users) I'd also be inclined to go with a "documents" folder -- plus a subfolder for each user. Each file name should include the date to prevent collisions. Over time, you'll have to deal with getting rid of old or outdated files either administratively or with a UI for users. Consider setting a maximum number of files or maximum byte count for each user. You'll also want to handle the files of departed users.