Load Test your Facebook Application!!

Once again, the need to load test your Facebook application before deployment has been proven out in the wild. Another company has seen their application crash and burn under a load that it either wasn’t expecting, or unable to deal with. The interesting part of this story, which seems to get told over and over, is the company that was the victim of the crash and the source of the load.

In this case, the application was Facebook’s newly released Facebook Stories application. This application allows users to tell the story about how they got onto Facebook and how it changed their life. The application became overwhelmed and eventually crashed due to the load placed on it by …

… rabid Justin Bieber fans

That’s right, I just wrote the most unlikely string of words that can show up in a blog about technology. The crash was reported by Justin himself, ironically on Twitter.

 Kids, don’t let this happen to your application. Before deployment, load test it with a tool like FriendRunner.

Update

Ahhh geez! Okay, this will teach me to trust Justin Bieber. All Facebook is now reporting that the rabid Justin Bieber fans never crashed the Facebook Stories app. Instead, he was asked to remove the tab for the application from his page because he was using it to solicit stories about himself instead of using it for the purpose it was intended for (How has Facebook changed your life?).

Okay, I was fooled, but the original story did have a believable provenance. I originally heard it from Randi Zuckerberg, who after all is the sister of …. She got it from All Facebook, which is a reliable source of great FB information.

I apologize to you dear reader, and will now make the commitment that this blog will never ever disseminate any more news about Justin Bieber, regardless of what it is or where it comes from.

FriendRunner – a Facebook testing tool

FriendRunner, the first testing platform specifically designed for Facebook applications has opened its beta program to public registration. FriendRunner allows developers to test their applications outside of the Facebook infrastructure, and has the ability to run large load tests in a realistic environment. Developers can use FriendRunner to help optimize their code by examining the interaction between their applications and the Facebook server, including information such as transaction timings and API call/parameter analysis. FriendRunner is cloud-based, so it does not need to be installed or require any hardware. It works for both Facebook Canvas as well as Facebook Connect applications.

Developers who wish to participate in this beta program can register for it at www.friendrunner.com.