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With mobile applications finally coming of age and voice over IP taking off, understanding the performance of such applications from the end user perspective has never been more important.
Keynote Systems Inc., the leading performance and availability monitoring service for Web applications, will step up to the plate over the next several weeks with new VOIP and mobile monitoring services.
But before those rollouts, the San Mateo, Calif., company will update its flagship Keynote Application Perspective monitoring service on March 8 with the ability to monitor and measure responses from each element in a multi-tiered application.
As enterprises roll out rich Internet media, their key challenge is to balance the customer experience between “whats possible” for Web applications and “whats good for the overall experience,” said Carol Carpenter, senior director of product management at Keynote in San Mateo.
The end user experience is not about the latest and greatest, but about having reliable content with expected speeds.
The new thing with Web 2.0—the programmable Web—is not just a higher level of interactivity.
“We expect a high level of responsiveness and reactivity,” she added.
Application Perspective 4.0 adds the ability to do custom scripting and provide more precise content validation to check that all elements of the n-tiered application responded appropriately.
The new JavaScript and advanced scripting support also allows users working with a single test script to create multiple user group profiles based on different geographies so that they can test across different regions.
As mobile applications become ready for prime time, Keynote is also addressing the need to monitor and measure the response times and the quality of mobile content.
It will launch its new Mobile Application Perspective on March 21.
The new service provides testing and validation of mobile content in an interactive fashion for portals and content developers.
It works across hundreds of mobile devices and a variety of profiles to allow enterprises to gain insight into how end users are experiencing mobile applications.
It provides a library of over 800 agents and device profiles to provide testing across the wide range of devices, operating systems, screen sizes, memory and processing capabilities in the mobile world.
Keynote, in order to perform live testing across different carrier wireless networks, is installing measurement devices in 20 locations around the world—four in the United States.
Initially it will test over Verizon Wireless, Sprint, Cingular and T-Mobile networks.
The service is packaged in two ways: for application and content testing and for monitoring content and applications.
At the same time, Keynote will also address the need to monitor the quality of voice calls across IP data networks when it introduces its new VOIP Perspective service.
The service, which found its start as a syndicated benchmarking study last year, was broadened into a suite of services that will include four different VOIP services.
Those four services focus on competitive benchmarking, operational performance management, service level agreement compliance and Reporting and Service Quality Management for Wireless.
The service is unique compared to tools used in-house in its ability to measure call quality between two end points, because it can span both IP and PSTN networks.
“Most of the tools measure quality of service within the [IP] network. But if youre making a call from the PSTN network and the voice signal entered the IP network with distortion, the network monitoring tool doesnt see that as a problem. Well be able to isolate issues created outside the IP network,” said Arun Bhardwaj, senior product manager.
The competitive benchmarking service, aimed at service providers such as Vonage, Verizon and others, provides monthly reports for trend analysis.
Operational performance monitoring provides users with daily or weekly reports on service performance.
SLA compliance reporting tracks promised versus actual service quality. It is aimed at call centers.
Service quality management for wireless is aimed at mobile carriers and can be used to show the impact of any changes on call quality. They will be available between now and the third quarter.