JBlitz 5.1 Compatibility with Previous Releases

Due to the nature of the development work that has been undertaken for JBlitz version 5.1, there are some areas where existing users of versions 4.0, 4.1, 4.2 and 5.0 may be affected when upgrading to version 5.1. For the most part, however, we anticipate that the changes should be minor in nature.

The changes have been summarized in two sections: changes from 4.x to 5.0 and changes from 5.0 to 5.1. Please review the applicable section(s) when upgrading JBlitz.

• Test configurations: Configuration files from versions 5.0 should be loadable within JBlitz 5.1. There may be some minor changes that could affect some of your test settings. Therefore we advise you to review the configurations loaded into version 5.1 just to check that they are setup as expected.

• Page level error text detection: The format of the symbol used to indicate a prior substitution in the error search text has changed. A new symbol has been added. See below.

• Customization API: Minor modifications - see below.

The format for the symbol used within the page level error text detection search text to indicate a prior substitution has been altered in JBlitz 5.1 compared to 5.0.

Additionally, a new symbol has been introduced in 5.1, $p1d$ ... $p9d$. This can be used within you search text as a marker for the URL decoded version of the nth prior substitution. JBlitz will substitute the appropriate value, URL decoded, that was generated for the substitution before performing the error text search. See the help page for how to configure page level error text detection within JBlitz.

A couple of minor changes have occurred to this API in the move from 5.0 to 5.1. These changes might affect code you have written to the old API.

Changes: the following list describes mainly method name changes that have occurred in the move from 5.0 to 5.1. Much of this is due to the addition of PUT, DELETE and HEAD request methods in 5.1 over and above the basic GET and POST of 5.0:

• The method getPostData() in the interface com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.RequestURL and the class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.BasicRequestURL has been renamed to getEntityData().
• The method createPostDataRequestURL() in the class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.BasicRequestURL has been renamed to createEntityDataRequestURL().
• Addition of the following methods to the class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.ProxyConfiguration for the purposes of handling proxy authorization: getHttpProxyUserName(), getHttpProxyPassword(), getHttpCredentials(), getSslProxyUserName(), getSslProxyPassword(), getSslCredentials(), getSslCredentialsWithFallback().
• The methods formatGetRequest() and formatPostRequest() in the interface com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.QueryExtension and the class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.DefaultQueryExtension have been amalgamated into the single method formatRequest().
• The method testRunEnding() has been removed from the interface com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.event.TestRunListener.

New features: JBlitz 5.1 has introduced two additional plug-in modules:

• URL Assistants - Java classes used to modify or replace the URLs used to download each web page.
• Dynamic Substitution Generators - Java classes that can be used to generate customized test data for use within test URLs.

More information: Read about the JBlitz 5.1 customization API including the new URL assistants and dynamic substitution generators is on our customization help page.

Full Javadoc for programming customization modules within the customization API is available here.

• Test configurations: Configuration files from versions 4.0, 4.1 and 4.2 should all be loadable within JBlitz 5.0. There may be some minor changes that could affect some of your test settings. Therefore we advise you to review the configurations loaded into version 5.0 just to check that they are setup as expected.

• Test results: Test results files from versions 4.0, 4.1 and 4.2 will be loadable within JBlitz 5.0. However, the format of error records has changed from 4.x to 5.0, so you may find that your old test results loaded into JBlitz 5.0 will not show errors previously encountered.

• Dynamic substitutions: Enhancements - see below.

• Customization API: Minor modifications and new features - see below.

• Licensing: for purchasers of the full version of JBlitz, the licensing scheme has changed. Upgraded 4.0, 4.1 and 4.2 license holders will be issued with new licenses for version 5.0.

Test URLs from versions 4.0, 4.1 and 4.2 that contain dynamic substitution elements may well be affected by the changes in the area of dynamic substitutions. Please review your test URLs when upgrading to version 5.0. Some of the 4.2 substitution types have been modified to rationalize their usage and improve them. Several new substitution types have been added for 5.0.

The following table lists the substitutions available in JBlitz 4.2 and JBlitz 5.0 alongside details of what has changed. The principal changes concern the integer substitutions at the top of the table and the addition of new substitution types %r00 ... %r99, %t, %T and %z00 ... %z99.

Further information on dynamic substitutions and their usage within JBlitz 5.0 is given in the help.

Some relatively minor changes have occurred to this API in the move from 4.x to 5.0. These changes might affect code you have written to the old API.

Changes: The following list describes classes removed and introduced and changes to method signatures in the move from 4.x to 5.0:

• Removal of com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.BasicRequestContext class. This class does not need to be publicly accessible as all references to it are via the underlying com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.RequestContext interface.
• Changes to the com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.QueryExtension interface:
  1. The method public boolean isCustomDownloadSequence() has been replaced by the method public DownloadSequence getCustomDownloadSequence(int, String)
  2. The method public NextPageInfo nextWebpage(RequestContext) has been removed (obsolete).
  3. The parameter ProxyConfiguration proxyConfig has been added to the methods formatGetRequest() and formatPostRequest().
  4. The method signature for the method disconnect() has been altered to introduce the input and output streams to be closed on disconnection.
• The class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.NextPageInfo has been removed (see above).
• The class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.DownloadSequence has been introduced (see above).
• The class com.clan.jblitz.custom.engine.ProxyConfiguration has been introduced (see above).

New features: JBlitz 5.0 has seen the introduction of two new ways of customize using your own Java code. These are:

• Response checkers - Java classes used to check the validity of any given response page or headers.
• Response informers - Java classes used to integrate with third party software and / or provide alerts or system notifications on any given response page download.

More information: Read about the JBlitz 5.0 customization API including the new response checkers and response informers is on our customization help page.

Full Javadoc for programming customization modules within the customization API is available here.