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aerbase_127015's avatar
aerbase_127015
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Oct 07, 2003

SMTP Load Balancing

Folks,

 

 

We are going to be using F5 to load-balance picture messaging (aka MMS) for wireless telcoms operators. Using F5 to load balance the HTTP/WAP traffic is straight forward enough, but SMTP is going to be tricky (with SMTP we will have to load balance the connection long before we get the data.... it is the data we want to load balance on).

 

 

If there is anybody out there that has tackled SMTP load balancing using F5, I be greatfull for any insight/wisdom they could pass on! :?:
  • Thanks Joe. I actually do believe this will be a development effort..... hence my posting it here. Looks like we'll have to do some sort of a proxy server process.... I'm trying to figure out if I can harness some of the Big-IP development stuff or just do it seperately.
  • The Universal Inspection Engine (UIE) is very powerful in the amount of the payload it can interrogate but this isn't the venue to get this type of question answered. We are here to support development related questions and this is really a BIG-IP deployment question. I recommend you contact F5 Technical Support where you can get a more acurate answer and if your situtation is unique, it can get integrated into the Ask F5 knowledge base.

     

     

    I'd recommend you take a look at www.askf5.com and if you don't find anything there contact tech support at www.f5.com/support

     

     

    -Joe
  • By "development", I meant developing iControl applications (the use of our interfaces, compiler issues, etc). iControl is an enabling technology allowing remote access to configuration and statistics methods that are alternately available in the GUI and command line. iControl can't help with building special purpose proxy unless you can implement the functionality in our rules engine (UIE). For this type of problem, I would first try to get it implemented in the BIG-IP's configuration (deployment) and then work on the development piece of building the iControl application to configure, manage, and monitor that deployment.

     

     

    Good luck, and let us know how you progress. We are interested in new ways our customers are using iControl so that we can help future customers who need to solve the same kinds of problems.

     

     

    -Joe