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devd4n's avatar
devd4n
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Jul 25, 2023

F5 XC | Rewrite Redirect functionality

Hi together,

for the migration to F5 XC we need to change the location header for certain responses (301,302) to match the hostname of the XC instance.


Is there currently a way to configure a rewrite redirect to an F5 XC virtual server?
I also couldn't find a configuration option that allows response header manipulation.

I am grateful for any hint.

Update:
i found a feature Request for that functionality:
https://www.f5cloudideas.com/ideas/MESH-I-149

but if there are any other ideas pls share with me 🙂

    • devd4n's avatar
      devd4n
      Icon for Altostratus rankAltostratus
      Aug 29, 2023
      Spoiler
       

      Hi Nikoolayy1,

      thank you for the hint. Unfortunately this setting only overwrites the host header. I.e. if the target/application server sends a 302 redirect back to itself and not to the FQDN/IP of the XC, the subsequent request is not routed via the XC, but a direct connect to the corresponding target server is performed.

      -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
      Example:

      FQDN-XC: www[.]test.ves.io
      FQDN destination: www[.]test.de

      REQUEST www[.]test.ves.io/redirect/uri => XC => www[.]test.de/redirect/uri
      RESPONSE 302 - Location: www[.]test.de/destination/uri => XC

      ===> At this moment XC have to rewrite the Location header to it's own FQDN (Location: www[.]test.ves.io/destination/uri)

      -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

      The only particular solution i found is to send all redirects directly for defined uris, but that is not usefull in all cases.

      • Nikoolayy1's avatar
        Nikoolayy1
        Icon for MVP rankMVP
        Aug 29, 2023

        Yup, I have seen this as for example if the origin pool is google.com then the google servers will send a redirect as the site is www.google.com, so I see the only way is for the XC routes to directly send traffic to the origin FQDN that is the final destination, so that a redirect to not be triggered.

         

        Outside of that in the origin pool setting or the XC route you can change the SNI or host value, so the origin pool FQDN to be one thing but the Host/SNI to have another value.

         

        But yes if there was a feature to change the response headers in the HTTP redirect response like the location one.