Introduction to AOL Pagetest Hosted Version - Measuring Website Performance

Below are some of the key features of the AOL Pagetest performance measuring tool that we will use to dissect different performance areas:

• Measures Web page load time in IE (v6, 7 or 8)
• Provides object-level timing details and visualization
• Suggests techniques for improving load times
• Extra features with hosted version (Http://www.webpagetest.org) :
• Choice of connection speed and location
• Multiple runs and First and Repeat View testing
• Object blocking, to exclude content
• Test History to track and share results
• Tabbed interface
• and more…

Below is a screenshot of the hosted version (Http://www.webpagetest.org)

Additionally, you can also configure 

• Select number of runs
• Summary stats will identify the run most representative of the average
• First View & Repeat View
• FV = Cleared cache/cookies

Once you hit the "START TEST" or "SUBMIT" button, the tests are queued and executed in the order submitted. Screen will refresh every 30 seconds to showcase progressive results of the test execution.

The key areas of focus in results are:

• Results summary
• Performance Waterfall
• Performance Checklist
• Screenshots as they appear during the page load test
• Distribution of HTTP Requests (images, text, html, javascript, css, etc...)
• Distribution of size of objects (images, text, html, javascript, css, etc...)

Below is screenshot of the performance waterfall:

(to be continued... for desktop/IE version)

Additional Reference(s);

1. Website Optimization: Speed, Search Engine & Conversion Rate Secrets
2. High Performance Web Sites: Essential Knowledge for Front-End Engineers
3. Speed Up Your Site: Web Site Optimization
4. Professional Web Site Optimization
5. Even Faster Web Sites: Performance Best Practices for Web Developers
6. Using genetic algorithm for dynamic and multiple criteria web-site optimizations [An article from: European Journal of Operational Research]
7. Advanced Web Metrics with Google Analytics
8. Landing Page Optimization For Dummies
9. Building Scalable Web Sites: Building, Scaling, and Optimizing the Next Generation of Web Applications