There are many free tools that can speed up your Internet-facing application troubleshooting and cut down the time to resolve. Let’s get it started and see which one is useful to you.
Slow-loading website/application
Probably the most famous issue while working in production support for internet-facing applications you will get is application slow for some user or from some location. If this happens to all the users, then you know there is a severe issue, and you may need to sit together with developers and analyze your infrastructure, code and optimize it. However, if this is for a few users or from some location, then this could be frustrating. Let’s say; you get a complaint that a user from China is having an issue while loading applications. But when you check at your end it all loads normally. How do you deal with it? If you have team presence in that location, then you may forward the issue to your colleague, however, if not then the following tools will allow you to check how much time it takes to load from various locations around the globe. GTMetrix – you can test from Dallas, Hong Kong, London, Mumbai, Brazil, and Vancouver using Chrome or Firefox. Webpage Test – page load time test from more than 60 locations with multiple browsers like IE, Chrome, Firefox, Android, etc. it’s not just to know the time it takes but also which resource is slow, so you know where to start investigating. Dotcom-Monitor – can select up to 24 locations to test from with Chrome, IE, Firefox, Safari, Android, or Blackberry. There are seven more which I’ve mentioned here.
Browser Compatibility Issue
Considering the increasing number of browsers, modern devices, and technologies, you can’t be 100% sure it will work on all the OS/browsers. If your application is cross-platform supported, then you can expect issues like:
Certain functionality doesn’t function appropriately in a particular browser Page broke on a specific version Not getting loaded as it should be
In order to replicate this issue for investigation, you must have those browser versions which may not be the case in reality. But don’t worry, there is a solution. You can leverage the following online tools which will give you a virtual browser so you can troubleshoot further.
Browser Shots Browser Stack Net Render
Finding DNS IP, Location, and Propagation
The DNS-related issue is always interesting, and without knowledge of necessary tools can be time-consuming. Supporting global application is always challenging, especially when you expect your website to be available on a broad set of devices, countries, networks. You may hear issues like:
The web page shows old data A website can’t be displayed URL not found
The issue could be due to various reasons and to start the investigation you would like to check the following.
Checking DNS IP
You may ask a user to check the DNS IP by nslookup or ping; however, if that is disabled at their network, then you can leverage on following online tools. DNS Watch – instantly check the resolving IP NsLookup – perform nslookup online Traceroute – very handy to check how a request is routing to the destination
Finding IP Location
If you are using CDN for web acceleration, then the CDN provider will resolve your DNS to multiple IPs based on request origin. There might be a situation where a user says the slow-loading application, and you want to check if a request is resolving to the nearest network location. IP Location – find the IP country, city, ISP IP2Location – another online tool that does the job
DNS Propagation
DNS changes may take up to 24 hours to be reflected globally. If you are receiving issues like changes are not reflected from the particular location, then the following tool will help you to check what IP your domain is resolving to. What’s My DNS – quickest way to check the resolving IP for your domain from the USA, Europe, India, China & Australia. Check DNS – find resolving IP from more than 50 locations worldwide. I hope the above tools help you in troubleshooting Internet-facing web applications.
