In todays world, organizations are fast accepting the web and related applications as part of their overall business strategies. They understand that the Internet provides them with the potential to target a very focused set of customers spread across a very diverse geography.
For a successful Internet presence, it is important that the web server and web applications are reliable, scalable and always available, irrespective of traffic volumes to the site.
To achieve this, you must test all your hardware and software using tools to check your web site, usually called web stress tools. These tools should ideally be used even before the site is on the World Wide Web. They can provide a reasonably good estimate about the performance of your web site and a company can identify issues before they arise.
Such issues might include slow response times while opening the web site, a limited number of users able to simultaneously browse the web site, or a cap on the number of requests that can be handled by a processing application. Based on the results, a webmaster can identify the bottlenecks and take corrective actions before they result in lost sales....