Networking Intermediate

What is Load Balancer?

A device or software that distributes network traffic across multiple servers to ensure reliability and performance.

Load balancers distribute incoming requests across a pool of backend servers. This prevents any single server from becoming overwhelmed, improves response times, and provides redundancy.

Algorithms include round-robin, least connections, weighted, and IP hash. Popular solutions include Nginx, HAProxy, AWS ELB, and F5. Load balancers operate at Layer 4 (transport) or Layer 7 (application).

Related Terms

ARP (Address Resolution Protocol)

A protocol that maps IP addresses to physical MAC addresses on a local network segment.

SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol)

A protocol for monitoring and managing network devices like routers, switches, servers, and printers remotely.

Overlay Network

A virtual network built on top of an existing physical network, enabling features like container networking and VPNs.

HTTPS Everywhere

The practice of securing all web traffic with TLS encryption, ensuring data integrity and privacy between browsers and servers.

A network communication method that sends data to multiple recipients simultaneously without duplicating packets for each recipient.

DNS (Domain Name System)

A hierarchical naming system that translates human-readable domain names into IP addresses.

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