Load Balancer: Redirect users to server1 until limit reached, then to server2

Wowza Developer Dojo
1

Hy,

my question is simple but I don’t know a possibility to do that:

Use-Case:

Regularly we have around 700 concurrent clients for ourlivestream. We are using ec2 instances and wowza load balancing. But sometimes the number of clients grows and is around 1200 @~1Mbit/s and we want to be flexible and of cause we are flexible within ec2 and wowza load balancing.

But as traffic is expensive in ec2, we are evaluating the option to move over to one softlayer machine with 5-10TB of traffic included and a 1Gbit/s interface. Because of the included traffic TBs, this is cheaper than ec2 traffic. Our problem is that the 1Gbit/s will regularly fit our needs but sometimes when we have unexpectedly more clients, it will hit the nework limit. Lets say 10Gbit/s network is not an option.

Now the question:

Is it possible to define a setting inside of the load balancer to redirect let’s say the first 800 clients always to server1 (in this case inside of softlayer) and if it hits 800, redirect all additional clients to an ec2 instance? If some clients on server1 leave and new clients request the stream, would like the clients to be redirected to server1 as long as it is not “full” with 800 clients.

I know this is not the normal load balancing case. But I saw only options to have a limit on one instance not to get more connections, but not a “fill up until xyz clients reached”.

Any ideas on this?

2

It is possible with customization to the current load balancer code. You can obtain this type of assistance by posting in our consultant forums and/or send a request to support@wowza.com for a consultants list.

3

Another approach that will achieve what you describe is to put the 2nd (…) Ec2 edge online, or enable it as an Load Balancer Sender, when the 1st edge reaches capacity. Then the 2nd edge will receive all new connections until it exceeds the connection count of the 1st.

Richard