NDT-DEV email list created

[Will Hawkins <>]

Hello Sebastian and Aaron (and MLab'ers CC'd),

We found a way to juice the Flash client and achieve the performance
necessary to accurately measure high-speed network connections.

The change is in r1082.

The solution was counterintuitive (at least for me). Instead of
attempting to read data from the socket as quickly as possible, the
TestS2C class just gets out of the way for the duration of the test. It
registers only for the "socket close" event. The runtime has the
necessary speed to keep up with the network.

The only problem with this method is keeping the user interface
up-to-date on progress throughout the test. Sebastian, this is where I
need you to double check. I believe that the code in r1082 properly
updates _s2cByteCount in the appropriate spot for those real-time
updates (specifically onSpeedUpdate). But, please double check!

We were able to measure a connection at ~ 775 mbps using the Flash
client, but it would be great to have as many people test this as
possible. To do so, you can use a pre-compiled version at

http://files.opentechinstitute.org/~hawkinsw/flash/test.html

On a separate, but related note, please also review r1083 for inclusion
in the NDT release. This change allows the client to re-query JS for the
test's hostname just before launching a test. This gives the wrapper
page the opportunity to do a AJAX query to determine the test's
hostname. This is important for MLab because we do dynamic server
selection using a web-based API.

I am eager to hear whether you have success with these changes or not. I
hope you do!

Will

On 06/17/2014 10:53 AM, Will Hawkins wrote:
> Just FYI: I believe that we have happened on to an actual solution for
> the "limit" to the performance of the S2C test. I am going to implement
> it today and do some testing.
> 
> If possible, could we hold out on doing a release for a little while
> pending this investigation?
> 
> Will
> 
> On 06/16/2014 01:50 AM, Sebastian Kostuch wrote:
>> Hi Will,
>> what you mentioned seems reasonable. Would it be possible to merge these
>> needed
>> changes into trunk in nearest time so we could make new release for
>> example tomorrow
>> or the day after tomorrow?
>>
>> Regards
>> Sebastian
>>
>> On 13.06.2014 17:36, Will Hawkins wrote:
>>> Sebastian,
>>>
>>> Thanks for sending this out! We (at MLab) are very interested in
>>> deploying a new version of the code so this 'release' looks like a
>>> good place to fit together! :-) In other words, we (again, MLab) are
>>> definitely going to do what you said in 3!
>>>
>>> I am out of the office, but I wanted to quickly respond to point 2.
>>> See below!
>>>
>>> Thanks again for driving this process forward!!
>>>
>>> Will
>>>
>>> On 6/13/14, 4:47 AM, Sebastian Kostuch wrote:
>>>> Hello,
>>>> NDT has been updated recently with some major changes (like
>>>> MSG_EXTENDED_LOGIN,
>>>> json support, new JS UI) so as I have mentioned in some earlier mail
>>>> that would be probably
>>>> good time to make new release. I have few questions related to this:
>>>> 1. New JS UI would fit well within this new release, however changes
>>>> related to this are still
>>>> on work branches and need review. Any feedback would be very
>>>> appreciated. These are
>>>> following issues: 129, 132, 133.
>>>> 2. Is Issue144 (URLLoader to flash) supposed to be contained also in
>>>> nearest release version?
>>>> If yes, then how does progress with work on this look like? If I recall
>>>> correctly then you, Will,
>>>> mentioned that they are well tested and thus almost ready, right?
>>>
>>> Some of these are still up for debate. I am going to forward an email
>>> that I just sent to the MLab team with an update on the conundrum
>>> around the HTTP test to give you a sense about why they are up for
>>> debate.
>>>
>>> But, there are also changes in that branch that *need* to be
>>> incorporated into anything that gets released. For instance, r1070.
>>> There are parts of r1064 that will have to be integrated no matter
>>> what (any of the changes that have to do with splitting start test and
>>> finalize test stages).
>>>
>>> Does that make sense?
>>>
>>>> 3. Along with new release on googlecode what do you think about pushing
>>>> these changes also
>>>> on M-Lab site? They bring many new features at all.
>>>>
>>>> Looking forward to your answers and I hope that next week could be
>>>> celebrated with making
>>>> new release of NDT :).
>>>>
>>>> Kind regards
>>>> Sebastian Kostuch
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>