INDUSTRY

Ixia announced today the latest release of IxScriptMate, its primary automated network test application. The IxScriptMate 5.20 release concludes a multi-phase development cycle to deliver a comprehensive platform for automated performance and functional testing in a single framework. IxScriptMate now provides the means for completely configuring, executing, and analyzing tests in one, automated environment - significantly reducing the need of Quality Assurance teams to develop and maintain the various components of custom test harnesses. Key to the delivery of this singular automation environment is a new Batched Test Scheduler featured in this release. The Batched Test Scheduler allows users to set up multiple, pre-defined tests to execute as a single batch job. These batches can then be scheduled to run automatically based on day of week and time of day parameters. Configuration/re-configuration of the Device under Test (DUT) also can be integrated within the batch job, enabling sophisticated sequences of operations to be executed over an extended period of time without the need for manual intervention. Phase 1 of Ixia's new plug-in architecture was announced with the release of IxScriptMate 5.10. This 5.20 release of IxScriptMate completes the test "plug-in interface," which allows customers or Ixia Custom Engineering (ICE) resources to develop test scripts that snap into the IxScriptMate framework. These user test scripts can immediately take advantage of the Graphical User Interface (GUI), graphing, reporting, and test results management facilities of IxScriptMate. The two-phased release of the plug-in architecture is an example of Ixia's rapid product development cycles, in this case in response to the increasing demands of customers to automate their test environments. IxScriptMate supports a large library of turnkey tests - over 80 total, covering Layer 2/3 performance and functional tests for both the data and IP control (routing) planes. This 5.20 release extends this library with the addition of several new test suites and tests: -- Bridging Test Suite - Provides for the performance and convergence testing of switched networks running Spanning Tree/Rapid Spanning Tree (STP/RSTP). -- Broadband Test Suite - Designed for testing the performance of broadband (e.g., Cable and DSL) connections and devices. -- Routing Tests- New performance tests for BGP, OSPF, and ISIS in both IPv4 and IPv6 environments.