Pools

This chapter describes the concept of a pool, a configuration object used to represent a logical group of back-end nodes.

Introduction

A virtual server assigns requests to a pool, which then load-balances these requests across a number of defined server nodes. Each node in the pool must be able to receive requests through the port specified, using the virtual server’s protocol.

As well as load balancing, each pool has its own settings for session persistence, SSL encryption of traffic, and health monitoring.

To access the pool configuration pages, click Services > Pools. Use this page to modify the settings for an existing pool, or to add a new pool.

When you create a pool, you select one of the following categories:

•Static: The list of nodes is declared and managed by the administrator through the Admin UI or one of the Traffic Manager APIs. This pool’s node list does not change unless modified by the administrator.

•Dynamic: The list of nodes is generated and managed automatically through the use of autoscaling or a plug-in Service Discovery script. To learn more about autoscaling, see Autoscaling or DNS-Derived Autoscaling. To learn more about Service Discovery plug-ins, see Service Discovery.

Each node is identified as a combination of a server name or IP address, and port. Examples of valid node entries are:

•server1.mysite.com:80

•192.0.2.1:1234

•[2001:DB8:1b6c:6402:250:56ff:fea6:3f43]:4444

To specify a node as an IPv6 address, use the URI bracket notation format [<IPv6 address>]:<port>.

The Traffic Manager does not support the use of IPv6 link local addresses for nodes.