F5 FastL4 but need HTTP header insert

The original load balancers do have compression turned on if the client requests it; the F5 appears to disable this or block it (just a guess; with compression disabled, the content is always clear text, even when requested with headers).

 

 

 

I've just reverified that the BIG-IP will not remove the Accept-Encoding headers on an HTTP vip with "compress disable"; they pass through to the server unchanged in my setup. Do you have any iRules that might be removing or altering them? Again, if you setup a test vip, you can see log the headers sent in the HTTP_REQUEST_SEND event to see if they are making it through the BIG-IP.

 

 

It appears that FastL4 is not any "better" than using http-wan-optimised and is worse because we cannot do the header insert for the client IP. Using FastHTTP is frustrating because it looks like we cannot use Irules or oneconnect (oneconnect saves us .2 - .3 seconds across the Atlantic).

 

 

 

If you're not seeing any better performance with fastL4, then FastHTTP will also not improve performance. That said, FastHTTP does support OneConnect (indeed, it's mandatory and built-in; no separate OneConnect profile is needed) and has limited iRule support. Also, FastHTTP cannot be configured with compression on the BIG-IP (meaning that uncompressed server responses will not be compressed; any responses that the BIG-IP receives that are already compressed will be forwarded to the client still compressed, just like with the standard HTTP profile).

 

 

I hope this helps.