Hash persistence allows you to create a persistence hash based on an existing iRule that uses the persist iRule command. Using hash persistence is the same as using universal persistence, except that with hash persistence, the resulting persistence key is a hash of the data, rather than the data itself. rule my_persist_irule { when HTTP_REQUEST  Full Article…

Normally, Windows servers running Microsoft Terminal Services can use a session broker (known as Terminal Services Session Directory in Windows Server 2003 and TS Session Broker in Windows Server 2008) to ensure that user sessions are assigned to specific servers. If a client initiates a connection request to the wrong terminal server, that server redirects  Full Article…

Session Initiation Protocol is an application-layer protocol that manages sessions consisting of multiple participants, thus enabling real-time messaging, voice, data, and video. A session can be a simple two-way telephone call or Instant Message dialogue, or a complex, collaborative, multi-media conference call that includes voice, data, and video. With SIP, applications can communicate with one  Full Article…

Source address affinity persistence, also known as simple persistence, tracks sessions based only on the source IP address. When a client requests a connection to a virtual server that supports source address affinity persistence, Local Traffic Manager checks to see if that client previously connected, and if so, returns the client to the same pool  Full Article…

SSL persistence is a type of persistence that tracks SSL sessions using the SSL session ID, and it is a property of each individual pool. Using SSL persistence can be particularly important if your clients typically have translated IP addresses or dynamic IP addresses, such as those that Internet service providers typically assign. Even when  Full Article…

Included in Local Traffic Managers Universal Inspection Engine (UIE) is a set of functions that you can specify within BIG-IP system iRules to direct traffic in more granular ways. Using these iRule functions, you can write expressions that direct traffic based on content data, or direct traffic to a specific member of a pool. Universal  Full Article…

BIG-IP® Local Traffic ManagerTM offers several features that you can use to intelligently control your SSL traffic. Some of the SSL traffic-management features are: The ability to authenticate clients and servers to maintain secure connections between a client system and the BIG-IP system, and between the BIG-IP system and a target web server The ability  Full Article…

In some cases, you might want to allow a client on an external network to send a request directly to a specific internal node (thus bypassing the normal load balancing server selection). To send a request directly to an internal server, a client normally needs to know the internal nodes IP address, which is typically  Full Article…

When you need to ensure that server responses always return through the BIG system, or when you want to hide the source addresses of server-initiated requests from external devices, you can implement a SNAT. A secure network address translation (SNAT) is a BIG-IP® Local Traffic ManagerTM feature that translates the source IP address within a  Full Article…

An iRule is a powerful and flexible feature within the BIG-IP® local traffic management system that you can use to manage your network traffic. Using syntax based on the industry-standard Tools Command Language (Tcl), the iRulesTM feature not only allows you to select pools based on header data, but also allows you to direct traffic  Full Article…