Load Testing Strategy for a Distributed Voice/Data Platform

Measuring performance of a voice/data platform consisting of hardware and system level software is a difficult task without the use of a specific application package. In this paper, the load testing strategy for a voice/data platform and the performance results for both inbound and outbound calls are presented. The hardware platform consisted of an AT&T Definity Generic 2 Private Automatic Branch Exchange (PABX), two multi-processor AT&T 3B4000 computers connected over a Local Area Network (StarLAN), dual ISDN links between System 85 PABX and 3B4000 computers. System level software consisted of UNIX System V Release 3, communication software for handling ISDN Q.931 messages and Adjunct Switch Application Interface (ASAf) messages. ASAI is an AT&T protocol between PABXS and applications running on adjunct processors. For both inbound and outbound calls, a high degree of voice/data synchronization can be achieved through ASAI level messages over ISDN links between AT&T Definity Generic 2 PABX and any application running on an adjunct processor (e.g. AT&T 3B family computers).