ABOUT SIEGE
Siege is an http load testing and benchmarking utility. It was designed to let web developers measure their code under duress, to see how it will stand up to load on the internet. Siege supports basic authentication, cookies, HTTP and HTTPS protocols. It lets its user hit a web server with a configurable number of simulated web browsers. Those browsers place the server "under siege."

PLATFORM SUPPORT
Siege was written on GNU/Linux and has been successfully ported to AIX, BSD, HP-UX and Solaris. It should compile on most System V UNIX variants and on most newer BSD systems. Because Siege relies on POSIX.1b features not supported by Microsoft, it will not run on Windows. Of course you can use Siege to test a Windows HTTP server.

NEWS & RELEASE INFORMATION

SIEGE-2.69 May 11, 2009 13:30 EDT is the current stable release. This version includes modifications to the joedog convenience library and several minor improvements and bug fixes.

SIEGE-2.68 April 20, 2009 07:30 EDT is the current stable release. This version adds support for digest authentication and includes several bug fixes. Users should see improvements in its ability to test HTTPS. 

SIEGE-BETA - Developers should submit patches that are diff'd against the latest beta.