Novell, Foundry team to speed Web site traffic

PROVO, UTAH - Novell is teaming with Foundry Networks to deliver transparent cache switching, a way to speed inbound Web pages to the end user and save network bandwidth.

Novell will promote Foundry's ServerIron switch as a front end to servers running Novell's Internet Caching Services (ICS) software. Together, the tools can offer transparent caching, which intelligently balances the load among caches. With transparent caching, users can set parameters to determine what is cached and which cache serves up the content.

There are two ways to proxy a Web server. A forward proxy acts as the middleman between a user's request and the cache, and caches inbound traffic only. A reverse proxy sits in front of a Web server and is used to speed Web site traffic.

Novell's ICS acts as a forward proxy when used with the Foundry switch. The switch enables the caching to be transparent. ServerIron also balances the load among multiple caches.

When a user requests a page, the request is sent to a ServerIron switch, which uses Layer 4 port information to isolate HTTP traffic and send the request to the cache. If the cache has the content, it's served to the end user from memory. If the content is not in the cache, the cache goes through a router to the Web and retrieves the content.

The switch can be configured to only cache certain content or to allow a certain group of workers to bypass the cache completely.

ServerIron can also balance the load among caches. Customers typically deploy more than one cache for redundancy, and large enterprises deploy caches at each WAN access point.

Contingencies

The Foundry-Novell deal was contingent upon Foundry showing that ServerIron is compatible with Novell's ICS, which runs on a dedicated server.

ICS is only available on servers from companies that have an OEM relationship with Novell. Last month, Novell announced a deal with Compaq and Dell to sell ICS on some servers.

Although NetWare 5 is the core operating system under the covers of ICS, the cache has a new file system that doesn't require NetWare in the network.

ServerIron sells for $6,000 with eight 10/100M bit/sec ports. Optional eight-, 16- and 24-port blades with Gigabit Ethernet uplinks, and an eight-port 1G bit/sec blade are also available.

Novell: (888) 321-4272; Foundry: (888) 887-2652