ideas for hosting peformance test

hosting peformance check script

[stevenjm]

Hi, i'm wanting to create a fairly comprehensive hosting test script for checking the speed, quality etc of a given host by inputing url into form.

Obviously ping and the basics would be fairly simple but i'm also looking for unique ideas i can use in the script for running tests on the host? I can't run a script on the host's to test its performance so what other alternative things could i possibly do?
I was thinking of using apache response codes ( or perhaps this is what ping already uses?) and somehow sending a huge request to the server which would generate 1000's of response codes and timing this and using a benchmark to get a rough idea of performance and other figures such as comparing it to ping speed to get an idea of processing power and speed?

I was thinking of using 404 pages for tests but they can vary from server to server.

I'm just guessing at this stage but really looking for some ideas on how to go about this (how i could measure performance in some way from a remote host) Much appreciate and feedback or ideas.

thanks heaps, by the way free script to anybody who gives me useful info or help hehe

[stevenjm]

So far i'm leaning towards getting the script to load index page of target host, measure its full size and then reload it a certan amount of times. calculate the times it takes too load based upon its size and benchmarks, take into account the ping speed and come to a performance figure that way. any feedback?

Obviously this idea has its own problems as in far as some index pages are dynmaic and rewritten to .html so processing engines for those will interfere with a reliable figure. Perhaps using an image from the index page? ( not so good for index pages which have no image or graphic)

[nick279]

stevenjm

I'd say take a step back, and perhaps come up with ten measurables that you know will work. Instead of trial and error, maybe a more structured approach could help?

- GD (create large images)
- Large mysql query
- Read/parse large file (same on all servers)
- Traceroute
- Recursion (try executing function until overloads :) )

etc

[stevenjm]

Thanks but this is why I am looking for novel ideas. The script will not have access to GD or MYSQL etc. It will be hosted at a remote location and just be availabl free as a tool for people to get an idea of how well a particular host performs.

any ideas?

[stevenjm]

Anybody? Ok, what ways are there to load a server from a remote location when no acces to server other than "user" is available. I was thinking of something similar to method used in denial of service attack only using requests that will return a response code and not actually have to load any particular page. Feedback? could this be done?