| Our engineers have been working with customers for | | | | of servers worldwide are able to accomplish. |
| years upgrading and improving their wide-area | | | | Since Akamai has one of their edge platform servers |
| networks in order to deliver the best application | | | | in just about every data center in the world, as well |
| performance to the remote sites possible. We are | | | | as in most cities, any time a request is made for |
| very familiar with how this is done when using a | | | | accelerated service, Akamai's Intelligent DNS points |
| leased circuit service such as MPLS, both with QoS at | | | | the user to a local server. When a user opens a |
| the routers, and Wide Area Application Acceleration. | | | | connection with that local server, there is very low |
| This has been much more difficult to do with | | | | latency, TCP window size is maximized, and any local |
| applications delivered over the Internet, and in most | | | | content that is already cached is delivered right away. |
| cases we haven't even tried. This has all changed | | | | The same thing occurs at the head end where the |
| now with Akamai's enterprise services that are | | | | application server resides -- it also communicates with |
| designed to speed up application delivery for remote | | | | the local Akamai server, getting the same benefits. |
| users over the Internet. | | | | Any dynamic content that has to be delivered from |
| Most people who are familiar with Akamai know that | | | | the application server to the end-user is transmitted |
| they started out by caching large files on their | | | | first to the local Akamai server, then between the |
| distributed servers in order to speed up static web | | | | two Akamai servers, then from the Akamai server |
| content delivery, and they still excel at doing this. A | | | | local to the end-user to the end-user. The Akamai |
| couple of years ago they rolled out an entirely new | | | | two Akamai server communication is done in a special |
| service dedicated to accelerating dynamic content | | | | way to maximize speed, reliability, and security of the |
| over to Internet. This service can make a huge | | | | traffic; basically three copies of each TCP packet is |
| performance improvement for any organization that | | | | sent over different Internet routes, as soon as the |
| delivers dynamic content over the Internet on a | | | | first packet gets there the other two are ignored. |
| national or international scale to remote workers, | | | | <strong>Network Security of Application |
| customers, or business partners. | | | | Acceleration |
| Now Akamai has taken this huge network of | | | | </strong> |
| servers, which is 61,000 separate servers in 70 | | | | There are significant benefits to application security |
| countries worldwide, and applied it to dynamic | | | | that area last through the use of the Akamai |
| content delivered over the Internet. Examples of this | | | | services. First off, the connections are made directly |
| include: | | | | to that Akamai servers as opposed to the |
| <ul> | | | | customer's head end application servers. This means |
| <li>Improve VDI (virtual desktop infrastructure) | | | | that any potential attacks that are made against the |
| performance.</li> | | | | servers are actually made against Akamai servers |
| <li>Speed up any end-user applications delivered | | | | and not the customers. Since the application delivery |
| by HTML or IP.</li> | | | | is distributed to the network of Akamai servers, it |
| <li>Remote office and end-user VPN | | | | also provides built-in defense against denial of service |
| acceleration.</li> | | | | and distributed denial of service attacks. |
| <li>Speed up large file transfers.</li> | | | | Furthermore, for customers that want to take |
| <li>WAN supplementation or replacement.< | | | | network security to the next level on their Internet |
| li> | | | | facing servers, there is a third product called Web |
| </ul> | | | | Application Firewall (WAF) that Akamai offers. The |
| <strong>Benefits of the Akamai Service | | | | W. AF module is integrated into the acceleration |
| </strong> | | | | service and provides for additional protection like: |
| So if a company uses the Akamai service to improve | | | | <ul> |
| the delivery of this dynamic content over the | | | | <li>Limiting HTTP Request methods.</li> |
| Internet what benefits does that provide to the | | | | <li>Stopping requests by robots crawlers and |
| organizations that use their service? | | | | security scanners.</li> |
| <ul> | | | | <li>Prevent command injection attacks for use |
| <li>Speed up remote user application | | | | of data validation.</li> |
| performance.</li> | | | | <li>Stop Trojan activity.</li> |
| <li>Reduce server load.</li> | | | | <li>Check for SQL information leakage.</li> |
| <li>Improve application delivery reliability.< | | | | </ul> |
| li> | | | | <strong>How is the Service Delivered? |
| <li>Reduce bandwidth usage at main server | | | | </strong> |
| datacenter.</li> | | | | The WAA and IPA services are more complex than |
| </ul> | | | | the traditional Akamai static caching service, so |
| There are two services from Akamai that are used | | | | Akamai has decided to deliver these services through |
| to accomplish this. The first is the IP Application | | | | channel partners that are expert in network |
| Accelerator (IPA), and the other is the Web | | | | optimization, application acceleration, and network |
| Application Accelerator (WAA). Both of these | | | | security. Since in many cases the customer may |
| products accelerate dynamic application content for | | | | want to look at supplementing or replacing their WAN |
| end-users, dramatically speeding up remote user | | | | with Akamai accelerated VPN service over the |
| application performance. The difference between the | | | | Internet, these channel partners all have a deep |
| two is the Web application accelerator is used | | | | understanding of routers, network protocols, and |
| primarily for the delivery of HTML content and is | | | | information delivery optimization. |
| optimized for that, whereas the IP application | | | | The acceleration can be done on how basis by |
| accelerator will accelerate the delivery of any TCP | | | | setting up a test DNS entry that Akamai manages, |
| content. | | | | and remote users can test the difference between |
| <strong>Who Can Use this Service? | | | | regular and accelerated Internet application |
| </strong> | | | | performance through the use of the test DNS entry. |
| There are a few things that should be noted about | | | | It is straightforward to set up and test the Akamai |
| these services. The first is that they are all delivered | | | | service. |
| as a managed service; there is no hardware to buy | | | | <strong>Where It Can Make the Most |
| or install. The second note is that this only applies to | | | | Difference |
| content delivered over the Internet. Akamai does no | | | | </strong> |
| acceleration on a company's internal LAN or WAN. | | | | Most organizations typically do a test run with |
| Finally, the larger that the geographic distance | | | | whatever application is causing the most issues and |
| between the servers and the client, the more of an | | | | problems at the time. This can be a VDI deployment |
| improvement there will be. If all your users are within | | | | to remote users that is experiencing unacceptably |
| a regional area, this is probably not a service for you. | | | | slow performance, slow remote desktop protocol |
| Whereas if you have end-users distributed nationally | | | | sessions, slow enterprise application performance, or |
| or internationally, especially in countries where IP | | | | other similar issues that users or customers are |
| delivery can be unreliable at times, this will make a | | | | complaining about. |
| huge difference. | | | | To find out more contact one of Akamai's channel |
| <strong>How Dynamic Application Acceleration | | | | partners that specializes in dynamic application |
| Works | | | | acceleration over the Internet, like <a |
| </strong> | | | | rel="nofollow" |
| There are specific technologies that Akamai uses to | | | | onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview(' |
| accomplish this dynamic application acceleration. Some | | | | outgoing/article_exit_link');" href=" Network |
| of these are common to all acceleration techniques, | | | | Systems</a>. |
| and include compression, caching, and token passing | | | | <strong>Sources |
| to substitute for dynamically cached content. Then | | | | </strong> |
| there are other technologies used that only an | | | | <a rel="nofollow" onclick="javascript:pageTracker. |
| organization like Akamai that has tens of thousands | | | | |