Is there a way to have sub-transactions in Gatling? - performance-testing

Requested page returns multiple results, response time of the requested page accordingly varies depending on the number of results.
With Gatling I'm having one transaction with all response times in it, in addition I'd like to have sub-transactions depending on the range of results for example:
BuildTable (10Txs)
BuildTable_0_10 (2Txs)
BuildTable_10_100 (6Txs)
BuildTable_100_all (2Txs)
The main goal to have this break-down visible in report, Any idea how can I reach this?

The way to have "transactions" in Gatling is to use "groups". But they wrap the delimited sequence of requests, so its name is computed before entering the sequence, hence in your case, before knowing the number of results.
So the only way is to know beforehand the number of expected results, e.g. like having this information in a feeder along some search keywords, and either switch to different branches, or compute the group name dynamically with a function.

Related

How to parallelize execution of a custom function formula while keeping the Google Sheet shareable and permissionless?

I have a Google Sheet with a custom function formula that: takes in a matrix and two vectors from a spreadsheet, does some lengthy matrix-vector calculations (>30 sec, so above the quota), before outputting the result as a bunch of rows. It is single-threaded, since that's what Google Apps Script (GAS) natively is, but I want to parallelize the calculation using a multi-threading workaround, so it speeds it up drastically.
Requirements (1-3):
UX: It should run the calculations automatically and reactively as a custom function formula, which implies that the user doesn't have to manually start it by clicking a run button or similar. Like my single-threaded version currently does.
Parallelizable: It should ideally spawn ~30 threads/processes, so that instead of taking >30 seconds as it now does (which makes it time out due to Google's quota limit), it should take ~1 second. (I know GAS is single-threaded, but there are workarounds, referenced below).
Shareability: I should ideally be able to share the Sheet with other people, so they can "Make a copy" of it, and the script will still run the calculations for them:
3.1 Permissionless: Without me having to manually hand out individual permissions to users (permissionless). For instance whenever someone "Makes a copy" and "Execute the app as user accessing the web app". My rudimentary testing suggest that this is possible.
3.2 Non-intrusive: Without users of the spreadsheet having to give intrusive authorizations like "Give this spreadsheet/script/app access to your entire Google Drive or Gmail account?". Users having to give an non-intrusive authorization to a script/webapp can be acceptable, as long as requirement 3.1 is still maintained.
3.3 UX: Without forcing users to view a HTML sidebar in the spreadsheet.
I have already read this excellent related answer by #TheMaster which outlines some potential ways of solving parallelization in Google Apps script in general. Workaround #3 google.script.run and workaround #4 UrlFetchApp.fetchAll (both using a Google Web App) looks most promising. But some details are unknown to me, such as if they can adhere to requirements 1 and 3 with its sub-requirements.
I can conceive of an other potential naïve workaround which would be to split the function up into several custom functions formulas and do the parallelization (by some kind of Map/Reduce) inside the spreadsheet itself (storing intermediary results back into the spreadsheet, and having custom function formulas work on that as reducers). But that's undesired, and probably unfeasible, in my case.
I'm very confident my function is parallelizable using some kind of Map/Reduce process. The function is currently optimized by doing all the calculations in-memory, without touching the spreadsheet in-between steps, before finally outputting the result to the spreadsheet. The details of it is quite intricate and well over 100 lines, so I don't want to overload you with more (and potentially confusing) information which doesn't really affect the general applicability of this case. For the context of this question you may assume that my function is parallelizable (and map-reduce'able), or consider any function you already know that would be. What's interesting is what's generally possible to achieve with parallelizationin Google Apps Script, while also maintaining the highest level of shareability and UX. I'll update this question with more details if needed.
Update 2020-06-19:
To be more clear, I do not rule out Google Web App workarounds entirely, as I haven't got experience with their practical limitations to know for sure if they can solve the problem within the requirements. I have updated the sub-requirements 3.1 and 3.2 to reflect this. I also added sub-req 3.3, to be clearer on the intent. I also removed req 4, since it was largely overlapping with req 1.
I also edited the question and removed the related sub-questions, so it is more focused on the single main HOWTO-question in the title. The requirements in my question should provide a clear objective standard for which answers would be considered best.
I realise the question might entail a search for the Holy Grail of Google Sheet multithreading workarounds, as #TheMaster has pointed out in private. Ideally, Google would provide one or more features to support multithreading, map-reduce, or more permissionless sharing. But until then I would really like to know what is the optimal workaround within the current constraints we have. I would hope this question is relevant to others as well, even considering the tight requirements.
If you publish a web-app with "anyone, even anonymous", execute as "Me", then the custom function can use UrlFetchApp.fetchAllAuthorization not needed to post to that web-app. This will run in parallelproof. This solves all the three requirements.
Caveat here is: If multiple people use the sheet, and the custom function will have to post to the "same" webapp (that you published to execute as you) for processing, Google will limit simultaneous executionsquota limit:30.
To workaround this, You can ask people using your sheet to publish their own web-apps. They'll have to do this once at the beginning and no authorization is needed.
If not, you'll need to host a custom server for the load or something like google-cloud-functions might help
I ended up using the naïve workaround that I mentioned in my post:
I can conceive of an other potential naïve workaround which would be
to split the function up into several custom functions formulas and do
the parallelization (by some kind of Map/Reduce) inside the
spreadsheet itself (storing intermediary results back into the
spreadsheet, and having custom function formulas work on that as
reducers). But that's undesired, and probably unfeasible, in my case.
I initially disregarded it because it involves having an extra sheet tab with calculations which was not ideal. But when I reflected on it after investigating alternative solutions, it actually solves all the stated requirements in the most non-intrusive manner. Since it doesn't require anything extra from users the spreadsheet is shared with. It also stays 'within' Google Sheets as far as possible (no semi- or fully external Web App needed), doing the parallelization by relying on the native parallelization of concurrently executing spreadsheet cells, where results can be chained, and appear to the user like using regular formulas (no extra menu item or run-this-script-buttons necessary).
So I implemented MapReduce in Google Sheets using custom functions each operating on a slice of the interval I wanted to calculate. The reason I was able to do that, in my case, was that the input to my calculation was divisible into intervals that could each be calculated separately, and then joined later.**
Each parallel custom function then takes in one interval, calculates that, and outputs the results back to the sheet (I recommend to output as rows instead of columns, since columns are capped at 18 278 columns max. See this excellent post on Google Spreadsheet limitations.) I did run into the only 40,000 new rows at a time limitation, but was able to perform some reducing on each interval, so that they only output a very limited amount of rows to the spreadsheet. That was the parallelization; the Map part of MapReduce. Then I had a separate custom function which did the Reduce part, namely: dynamically target*** the spreadsheet output area of the separately calculated custom functions, and take in their results, once available, and join them together while further reducing them (to find the best performing results), to return the final result.
The interesting part was that I thought I would hit the only 30 simultaneous execution quota limit of Google Sheets. But I was able to parallelize up to 64 independently and seemingly concurrently executing custom functions. It may be that Google puts these into a queue if they exceed 30 concurrent executions, and only actually process 30 of them at any given time (please comment if you know). But anyhow, the parallelization benefit/speedup was huge, and seemingly nearly infinitely scalable. But with some caveats:
You have to define the number of parallelised custom functions up front, manually. So the parallelization doesn't infinitely auto-scale according to demand****. This is important because of the counter-intuitive result that in some cases using less parallelization actually executes faster. In my case, the result set from a very small interval could be exceedingly large, while if the interval had been larger then a lot of the results would have been ruled out underway in the algorithm in that parallelised custom function (i.e. the Map also did some reduction).
In rare cases (with huge inputs), the Reducer function will output a result before all of the parallel (Map) functions have completed (since some of them seemingly take too long). So you seemingly have a complete result set, but then a few seconds later it will re-update when the last parallel function returns its result. This is not ideal, so to be notified of this I implemented a function to tell me if the result was valid. I put it in the cell above the Reduce function (and colored the text red). B6 is the number of intervals (here 4), and the other cell references go to the cell with the custom function for each interval: =didAnyExecutedIntervalFail($B$6,S13,AB13,AK13,AT13)
function didAnyExecutedIntervalFail(intervalsExecuted, ...intervalOutputs) {
const errorValues = new Set(["#NULL!", "#DIV/0!", "#VALUE!", "#REF!", "#NAME?", "#NUM!", "#N/A","#ERROR!", "#"]);
// We go through only the outputs for intervals which were included in the parallel execution.
for(let i=0; i < intervalsExecuted; i++) {
if (errorValues.has(intervalOutputs[i]))
return "Result below is not valid (due to errors in one or more of the intervals), even though it looks like a proper result!";
}
}
The parallel custom functions are limited by Google quota of max 30 sec execution time for any custom function. So if they take too long to calculate, they still might time out (causing the issue mentioned in the previous point). The way to alleviate this timeout is to parallelise more, dividing into more intervals, so that each parallel custom function runs below 30 second.
The output of it all is limited by Google Sheet limitations. Specifically max 5M cells in a spreadsheet. So you may need to perform some reduction on the size of the results calculated in each parallel custom function, before returning its result to the spreadsheet. So that they each are below 40 000 rows, otherwise you'll receive the dreaded "Results too large" error). Furthermore, depending on the size the result of each parallel custom function, it would also limit how many custom functions you could have at the same time, as they and their result cells take space in the spreadsheet. But if each of them take in total, say 50 cells (including a very small output), then you could still parallelize pretty much (5M / 50 = 100 000 parallel functions) within a single sheet. But you also need some space for whatever you want to do with those results. And the 5M cells limit is for the whole Spreadsheet in total, not just for one of its sheet tabs, apparently.
** For those interested: I basically wanted to calculate all combinations of a sequence of bits (by brute force), so the function was 2^n where n was the number of bits. The initial range of combinations was from 1 to 2^n, so it could be divided into intervals of combinations, for example, if dividing into two intervals, it would be one from 1 to X and then one from X+1 to 2^n.
*** For those interested: I used a separate sheet formula to dynamically determine the range for the output of one of the intervals, based on the presence of rows with content. It was in a separate cell for each interval. For the first interval it was in cell S11 and the formula looked like this:
=ADDRESS(ROW(S13),COLUMN(S13),4)&":"&ADDRESS(COUNTA(S13:S)+ROWS(S1:S12),COLUMN(Z13),4) and it would output S13:Z15 which is the dynamically calculated output range, which only counts those rows with content (using COUNTA(S13:S)), thus avoiding to have a statically determined range. Since with a normal static range the size of the output would have to be known in advance, which it wasn't, or it would possibly either not include all of the output, or a lot of empty rows (and you don't want the Reducer to iterate over a lot of essentially empty data structures). Then I would input that range into the Reduce function by using INDIRECT(S$11). So that's how you get the results, from one of the intervals processed by a parallelized custom function, into the main Reducer function.
**** Though you could make it auto-scale up to some pre-defined amount of parallelised custom functions. You could use some preconfigured thresholds, and divide into, say, 16 intervals in some cases, but in other cases automatically divide into 64 intervals (preconfigured, based on experience). You'd then just stop / short-circuit the custom functions which shouldn't participate, based on if the number of that parallelised custom function exceeds the number of intervals you want to divide into and process. On the first line in the parallelised custom function: if (calcIntervalNr > intervals) return;. Though you would have to set up all the parallel custom functions in advance, which can be tedious (remember you have to account for the output area of each, and are limited by the max cell limit of 5M cells in Google Sheets).

Flurry Parameter limitation

In my application i have an event which has been occurred for more than 1000 times when i am trying to retrieve that event along with the parameters i am getting only 500 parameter values only.
Is there any way to get all the records?
Api call:
http://api.flurry.com/eventMetrics/EventapiAccessCode=APIACCESSCODE&apiKey=APIKEY&startDate=STARTDATE&endDate=ENDDATE&eventName=EVENTNAME&versionName=VERSIONNAME
Thanks
The Event parameter show up the top 500 values. All parameter values beyond the top 500 get grouped into 'Others'.
(Full disclosure: I work in the Support team at Flurry)
It seems there is no way to drill down to the info beyond the top 500 values.
There is currently no way to drill down beyond the Top 500 values. If
you require additional information, one best practice is to create
groupings for the Parameter values (e.g. if the values can be
individual numbers, for example, create groups such as ‘1-10,’ ‘11-20’
and so on, rather than storing each individual value).
https://developer.yahoo.com/flurry/docs/faq/events/

Dynamics CRM 2011 Import Data Duplication Rules

I have a requirement in which I need to import data from excel (CSV) to Dynamics CRM regularly.
Instead of using some simple Data Duplication Rules, I need to implement a point system to determine whether a data is considered duplicate or not.
Let me give an example. For example these are the particular rules for Import:
First Name, exact match, 10 pts
Last Name, exact match, 15 pts
Email, exact match, 20 pts
Mobile Phone, exact match, 5 pts
And then the Threshold value => 19 pts
Now, if a record have First Name and Last Name matched with an old record in the entity, the points will be 25 pts, which is higher than the threshold (19 pts), therefore the data is considered as Duplicate
If, for example, the particular record only have same First Name and Mobile Phone, the points will be 15 pts, which is lower than the threshold and thus considered as Non-Duplicate
What is the best approach to achieve this requirement? Is it possible to utilize the default functionality of Import Data in the MS CRM? Is there any 3rd party Add-on that answer my requirement above?
Thank you for all the help.
Updated
Hi Konrad, thank you for your suggestions, let me elaborate here:
Excel. You could filter out the data using Excel and then, once you've obtained a unique list, import it.
Nice one but I don't think it is really workable in my case, the data will be coming regularly from client in moderate numbers (hundreds to thousands). Typically client won't check about the duplication on the data.
Workflow. Run a process removing any instance calculated as a duplicate.
Workflow is a good idea, however since it is being processed asynchronously, my concern is the user in some cases may already do some update/changes to the data inserted, before the workflow finish working.. therefore creating some data inconsistency or at the very least confusing user experience
Plugin. On every creation of a new record, you'd check if it's to be regarded as duplicate-ish and cancel it's creation (or mark for removal).
I like this approach. So I just import like usual (for example, to contact entity), but I already have a plugin in place that getting triggered every time a record is created, the plugin will check whether the record is duplicat-ish or not and took necessary action.
I haven't been fiddling a lot with duplicate detection but looking at your criteria you might be able to make rules that match those, pretty much three rules to cover your cases, full name match, last name and mobile phone match and email match.
If you want to do the points system I haven't seen any out of the box components that solve this, however CRM Extensions have a product called Import Manager that might have that kind of duplicate detection. They claim to have customized duplicate checking. Might be worth asking them about this.
Otherwise it's custom coding that will solve this problem.
I can think of the following approaches to the task (depending on the number of records, repetitiveness of the import, automatization requirement etc.) they may be all good somehow. Would you care to elaborate on the current conditions?
Excel. You could filter out the data using Excel and then, once you've obtained a unique list, import it.
Plugin. On every creation of a new record, you'd check if it's to be regarded as duplicate-ish and cancel it's creation (or mark for removal).
Workflow. Run a process removing any instance calculated as a duplicate.
You also need to consider the implication of such elimination of data. There's a mathematical issue. Suppose that the uniqueness' radius (i.e. the threshold in this 1D case) is 3. Consider the following set of numbers (it's listed twice, just in different order).
1 3 5 7 -> 1 _ 5 _
3 1 5 7 -> _ 3 _ 7
Are you sure that's the intended result? Under some circumstances, you can even end up with sets of records of different sizes (only depending on the order). I'm a bit curious on why and how the setup came up.
Personally, I'd go with plugin, if the above is OK by you. If you need to make sure that some of the unique-ish elements never get omitted, you'd probably best of applying a test algorithm to a backup of the data. However, that may defeat it's purpose.
In fact, it sounds so interesting that I might create the solution for you (just to show it can be done) and blog about it. What's the dead-line?

Efficiently searching large list of strings

I have a large list of strings which needs to be searched by the user of an iPhone/Android app. The strings are sorted alphabetically, but that isn't actually all that useful, since a string should be included in the results if the search query falls anywhere inside the string, not just the beginning. As the user is typing their search query, the search should be updated to reflect the results of what they currently entered. (e.g. if they type "cat", it should display the results for "c", "ca" and "cat" as they type it).
My current approach is the following:
I have a stack of "search results", which starts out empty. If the user types something to make the search query longer, I push the current search results onto the stack, then search through only the current search results for the new ones (it's impossible for something to be in the full string list but not the current results in this case).
If the user hits backspace, I only need to pop the search results off of the stack and restore them. This can be done nearly instantaneously.
This approach is working great for "backwards" searching (making the search query shorter) and cases where the search query is already long enough for the number of results to be low. However, it still has to search though the full list of strings in O(n) time for each of the first few letters the user types, which is quite slow.
One approach I've considered is to have a pre-compiled list of results of all possible search queries of 2 or 3 letters. The problem with this approach is that it would require 26^2 or 26^3 such lists, and would take up a pretty large amount of space.
Any other optimizations or alternate approaches you can think of?
You should consider using a prefix tree (trie) to make a precomputed list. I'm not sure showing the result for 'c', 'ca', and 'cat' on a sub-character basis is a good idea. For example, let's say the user is searching for the word 'eat'. Your algorithm would have to find all the words that contain 'e', then 'ea', and finally 'eat'; most of which will be of no use for the user. For a phone app, it would probably be better if you do it on a word basis. A multi-word string can be tokenized so searching for 'stake' in 'a large stake' will work fine, but not searching for 'take'.
I notice that Google, and I imagine others, do not provide a full list when only 1 or 2 characters have been pressed. In your case, perhaps a good starting point is to only begin populating the search query results when the user has typed a minimum of 3 characters.
For later versions, if it's important, you can take a cue from the way Google does it, and do more sophisticated processing: keep track of the actual entries that previous users have selected, and order these by frequency. Then, run a cron job every day on your server to populate a small database table with the top 10 entries starting with each letter, and if only 1 or 2 letters have been pressed, use the results from this small table instead of scanning the full list.
You could use Compressed suffix tree

Alternative to intent=match?

I'm trying to match existing data to Foursquare Venues. I've tried matching about 100,000 records using intent=match and 30% of them don't return results. Now, sometimes these venues are actually missing, but sometimes the search just isn't finding results that would be obvious to a human. For example:
https://api.foursquare.com/v2/venues/search?intent=match&ll=40.075800000000001,-80.698800000000006&query=19%20TH%20HOLE
That returns no results. However, if I search for "19TH HOLE" I do get a result.
I could just add all these non-matches to Foursquare, but it seems that I'd end up creating a whole lot of duplicates... and I don't want to abuse the system. We're trying to make Foursquare our Venues database, and we can't go and process 300,000 records without matches by hand, either.
I'm open to suggestions on what else I can do.
You can "relax" the search strictness by specifying intent=checkin or intent=browse and using your own criteria to determine if the top result is the one you're looking for.

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