Drupal's already best-in-class performance is about to get even better thanks to a groundbreaking collaboration between Google and Tag1 Consulting. The initiative led by core release manager Nathaniel Catchpole (catch) integrates automated performance testing directly into the Drupal development process, resolving the need for manual testing. Faster sites are proven to get more page views, drive more revenue, and increase user satisfaction - making Drupal better than ever for users and developers.

At this talk we will explain the motivation for and basics of Gander, do a live demo and show you how to use it for Drupal Core development and on your own site. We will also talk about the benefits, how we got here, where we go from here, and solicit your feedback.

For Drupal Core, the goal is to detect problems much earlier in the lifecycle when it's easier to find and address them. By running performance testing frequently using automation we eliminate both regressions and reliance on a few overworked framework managers who currently do this manually and infrequently.

Like Drupal’s QA system, the automated performance testing framework is integrated into Drupal core and the core development process, uses tools that we are already familiar with (PHPUnit) and is already available to anyone.