Server load balancing can be considered as method to disseminate work load over two or more servers for attaining maximized scalability, redundancy and security. Technically, the “balancing” can be done in a software or a dedicated hardware. However, both would lead to distribution of load all over various machines.

1. Features and Benefits of Server Load Balancing
Server load balancing can be considered as method to disseminate work load over two or more servers
for attaining maximized scalability, redundancy and security. Technically, the “balancing” can be done in
a software or a dedicated hardware. However, both would lead to distribution of load all over various
machines. From a web server perspective, the server load balancer can be used by end users
conveniently to avail one URL. The user requests send to this place can be then managed by the load
balancer and sent transparently to one of the accessible devices behind the scenes that conducts the
original processing.
There are many traits of server load balancers and some have capacities and features that others lack.
Two essential aspects that can play a critical role when implementing a load balancer in a GIS platform
are:
The Physical Features
This focuses on hardware and software. The software based solutions can have the benefits of lower
expenses and the capacity to operate on present servers. On the other hand, the hardware based
solutions can provide more features and might also have inbuilt accelerators for specific SSL offload
engines.
The Balancing Metrics
Server load balancers needs to determine the way they are going to spread the work that needs to be
done through various kinds of metric or scheduler. Generally, this can be attained through balancing
algorithms, like server load, round robin, and server computing power, random or least connection.
Having the capacity to personalize this process might prove to be useful and handy. In case the backend
servers are not all identical, then adjusting the balancing processes depending on the server computing
power might offer an even load as lesser machines are not overloaded.
Today service providers specializing in SSL VPNs solutions have also come up with efficient server load
balancing solutions that offers the following services:
 Offers clustered load balancing for disseminating traffic, conducting health checks and
maintaining session persistence all through various servers
 Allowing load balancing for any amount of servers from one URL and IP address
 Helps in offloading the TCP and SSL processing for up to ten time greater server efficiency
 Compression, caching and SSL acceleration for up to five times improved application
performance
 Provides a high-performance virtual load balancing with full feature for VMware and Citrix
platforms
These apart, advanced load balancing solutions also comprise integrated traffic management and
application acceleration function that includes adaptive compression, SSL acceleration, connection
multiplexing, dynamic caching, and content routing. Furthermore, the service quality offers unmatched
control over application traffic and the capacity to enhance the application performance significantly.
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