Simulate records in database without entering any

Question

Hi,

I've nearly finished the development of a project and would like to test its performance, especially the database query calls. I'm using Linq to SQL to search via usernames, but I've only got around 10 'users' in my database, so I can't really get a decent speed reading. How can I simulate thousands/millions of users in the database without actually creating new records? I've read about Selenium, but it seems that is good for repeat actions (simulating concurrent users?). Are there any other tools I should look into, or are there any options in VS 2008 (Professional Edition)?

Thanks

Answer 1

You can "trick" SQL Server into thinking there are more records than there actually are in a table using the approach outlined in this article. See the section on False SQL Server Statistics

e.g.

UPDATE STATISTICS TableName WITH ROWCOUNT=100000

will create statistics for the table as if it has 100000 rows in. You can then see what effect this has on the execution plan. But note this is undocumented functionality as so it may give quirky behaviour.

You could just populate your table with sample data. There's various tools available to help out with that like, Red Gate's SQL Data Generator. I prefer actually having large data volumes as I think that is what will be more accurate.