Redirection

and Load Balancing

Herng-Yow Chen
 Outline
 HTTP redirection
 DNS redirection
 Anycast routing
 Policy routing
 IP MAC forwarding
 IP address forwarding
 Outline (cont.)
 The Web Cache Coordination Protocol (WCCP)
 The Intercache Communication Protocol (ICP)
 The Hyper Text Caching Protocol (HTCP)
 The Network Element Control Protocol (NECP)
 The Cache Array Routing Protocol (CARP)
 The Web Proxy Autodiscovery Protocol (WPAD)
 Why Redirect?
 Redirection is a fact of life in the modern Web because
HTTP applications always want to do three things:
 Perform HTTP transactions reliably
 Minimize delay
 Conserve network bandwidth
 For these reasons, web content often is distribute in
multiple locations.
 Redirection can be considered as a set of techniques
that help to find “best” distributed content.
 Redirection vs. load balancing
 Most redirection deployments include some form of load
balancing.
 Conversely, any form of load balancing involved redirection
techniques.
 Where to redirect
 General techniques: many redirection techniques work
for web servers, proxies, caches, and gateways because
of their common, server-like traits.
 Specialized techniques: specially designed for a
particular class of endpoint.
 Web servers handle requests on a per-IP basis.
Distributing requests to duplicate servers means that
each request for a specific URL should be sent to an
optimal web server (the one nearest to the client, or the
least-loaded one, or some other optimization).
 Proxies tend to handle requests on a per-protocol basis,
all HTTP traffic in the neighborhood of a proxy should go
through the proxy.
 Overview of redirection protocols
 The goal of redirection is to send HTTP m
essages to available web servers as quickl
y as possible. Several mechanisms can be
provided for redirection:
 The browser application’s proxy configuration.
(only for redirecting traffic to proxies)
 HTTP redirections.
 DNS resolvers. (can be used for redirecting tra
ffic to any server).
 TCP/IP Routing (e.g. Routers and switches)
 HTTP redirections
 How it works (next slide)

 Basis for rerouting (many options)

 From round-robin load balancing,
 to minimizing latency,
 To choosing the shortest path
 Limitation
 Can be slow – every transaction involves the extra
redirect step. Also, the first server must be able to
handle the request load
 HTTP/1.0 302 Redirection

HTTP Redirections Locations: http://161....

(a)Alice sends HTTP request to www.joes.hardware.com

(b)Server returns 302redirect to

161.58.228.45
Alice
(c) B
rows
e r re
s e nd
s HTT 161.58.228.46
P req www.joes-hardware.com
ue st,thi 161.58.228.45 161.58.228.47
s tim
e to 1
Internet 6 1 .5 8
.228.
45
Bob

(d)Bob sends HTTP request to www.joes.hardware.com

Alice
(e)Server returns 302redirect to
161.58.228.46
(f)Browser 161.58.228.46
resends HT www.joes-hardware.com
TP request, 161.58.228.45 161.58.228.47
this time to
Internet 161.58.228
.46

Bob
 HTTP Redirection (cont.)
 Several disadvantages
 A significant amount of processing power is
required from the original server. (Sometime
almost as much server horse-power is
required to issue the redirect as would be to
serve up the page itself.)
 User delays are increased, because two round
trips are required to access pages.
 If the redirecting server is broken, the site will
be broken.
 DNS redirections
 How it works (next slide)
 Try nslookup ccsun.ncnu.edu.tw, www.yaoo.com

 Basis for rerouting (many options)

 From round-robin load balancing,
 to minimizing latency,
 To choosing the shortest path

 Limitation
 Need to configure DNS server
 DNS Redirection
DNS server www.joes-hardware.com
Decides whether to www.joes-hardware.com
10.10.10.4
resolve to 10.10.10.1
Server4
10.10.10.1, Server1

10.10.10.2,
10.10.10.3,
10.10.10.4 Backbone network

router

Switch

www.joes-hardware.com

Edge network
10.10.10.2
www.joes-hardware.com Server2

10.10.10.3
Server3
 DNS round robin for load
balancing
(a)Alice asks DNS for IP address of www.cnn.com

(b) DNS replies with 207.25.71.5

Alice
(c) A
lice s
ends
HTTP
reque 207.25.71.6
st to DNS Server
2 0 7 .2 207.25.71.5 207.25.71.7
5 .7 1 .
Internet 5

Bob

(d)Bob asks DNS for IP address of www.cnn.com

Alice
(eDNS replies with 207.25.71.6

(f) Bob sen 207.25.71.6

ds HTTP re DNS Server
quest to 20 207.25.71.5 207.25.71.7
7.25.71.5
Internet
Bob
 The impact of DNS caching
 DNS address rotation spreads the load around, because
each DNS lookup to a server gets a different ordering of
server addresses.
 However, this load balancing isn’t perfect, because the
results of the DNS lookup may be memorized and reused
by applications, operating systems, and some primitive
child DNS servers.
 Many web browsers perform a DNS lookup for a host but
then use the same address over and over again, to
eliminate the cost of DNS lookups and because some
servers prefer to keep talking to the same client.
 The impact of DNS caching
 Furthermore, many OSs perform the DNS lookup
automatically, and cache the result, but don’t rot
ate the addresses.
 Consequently, DNS round robin generally doesn’
t balance the load of a single client – one client t
ypically will be stuck to one server for a long tim
e.
 However, it can spread the aggregate load of m
ultiple clients. As long as there is a modestly larg
e number of clients with similar demand, the loa
d will be relatively well distributed across servers.
 Other DNS-based redirection
algorithms
 Load-balancing algorithms
 DNS servers keep track of the load on the web
servers and place the least-loaded web servers at the
front of the list.
 Proximity-routing algorithms
 DNS servers can attempt to direct users to nearby
web servers, when the farm of web servers is
geographically dispersed.
 Fault-masking algorithms
 DNS servers can monitor the health of the network
and route requests away from service interruptions or
other faults.
DNS request involving
authoritative server
 DNS-based redirection (cont.)
 Typically, the DNS server that runs sophisticated
server-tracking algorithm is an authoritative
server that is under the control of the content
provider.
 Several distributed hosting services use this DNS
redirection model.
 One drawback
 The authoritative DNS serer uses to make its decision
is the IP address of the local DNS server,
 Not the IP address of the client.
 Anycast Addressing
www.joes-hardware.com

10.10.10.1
Server1

Backbone network

router

router

Switch

router

www.joes-hardware.com

Edge network
10.10.10.2
www.joes-hardware.com Server2

10.10.10.3
Server3
 IP MAC Forwarding

Client MAC 1

Hub MAC3 Switch MAC4

To Internet
Gateway MAC5

Client MAC 2
 IP MAC Forwarding

Client MAC 1

Hub MAC3 Switch MAC4

To Internet
Gateway MAC5

Port 80 traffic

Client MAC 2
Caching proxy
MAC6
 IP Address Forwarding
Destination
proxy

Joe’s server
Backbone network

router
Switch Joe’s edge
network

Edge network
 IP Address Forwarding

Form:Client: Form:NAT device:

1.1.1.1 3.3.3.3.
80 To:Joe’s Server 80 To:Proxy
2.2.2.2 Passes through
network address 4.4.4.4
80 translation (NAT)
80
device

T P d a ta ■
HT a t a ■
──────
──────
─
HTTP d
─
────── ──────
─
────── ──────
──
───── ──
────── ──────
──── ─
─
──────
──────
Proxy Auto-configuration
PAC file autodiscovery
 GRE packet encapsulation
To Proxy: Proto:GRE
3.3.3.3
8080

Form:Client:
Form:Client:
1.1.1.1
1.1.1.1
80 To:Joe’s Server
80 To:Joe’s Server
2.2.2.2 Passes through WCCP
router 2.2.2.2
80
80

T TP d a t a ■ ■
H ─ H T TP d a t a
──────
────── ─
──────
─ ──────
────── ──────
─
────── ─ ──────
────── ──────
─ ─
─────
──────
Cache Array Routing Protocol
Cache Array Routing Protocol
Hyper Text Caching protocol