F5: Database Solutions
Almost every business relies on database systems for accurate, up-to-date information. Without these repositories of mission-critical data, most businesses are unable to perform normal daily transactions or create summary reports that help management make strategic decisions. Databases, especially Relational Databases, are the power behind most every substantial networked application. Web sites use databases to store content; e-commerce sites use databases to store catalogs, and customer/order information, and Web services can provide access to legacy databases. But it is not just Internet applications that rely on databases. Corporate email systems, financial repositories and applications, and customer or sales records all rely on databases to keep track of critical data. There are many vendors in the multi-billion dollar database market that focus their products on providing customers with fast, reliable, and robust databases. But choosing and implementing one of these popular databases does not solve every data storage problem. Because of the costs associated with managing and increasing the capacity of databases, enterprises are using additional products to assist in these areas. By implementing new technologies with existing databases, companies benefi t from signifi cant cost savings, which can equal the original database investment. There are a number of challenges facing companies with deployed database applications: Providing scalability - One of the fi rst challenges faced by companies with databases is scalability. Database hardware is expensive, and the high premium for excess capacity is often too substantial at the time of deployment. The goal is to effectively add database capacity, while maintaining performance and minimizing cost. Enhancing data distribution - Employing a data distribution scheme allows a company more control over load distribution, and can eliminate bottlenecks. Data Distribution is a key to diversifying and ensuring high availability for your databases. Providing integrated management - Database management already requires specially trained employees known as Database Administrators. Setting up databases is a daunting task, but managing and changing databases while they are running is an extremely difficult task, for even the most talented Database Administrator.
F5 BIG-IP LTM and GTM products enhance the performance, scalability, data distribution, and management of your database applications. Scaling databases requires sophisticated application traffi c management. Using Virtual IP’s and Pools, the BIG-IP product can balance and direct database traffi c on the network in many different ways. But the BIG-IP product goes further than balancing and directing traffic. Through its Extended Content Verifi cation (ECV), the BIG-IP product can perform advanced health checks that can simulate database connections and transactions to report accurate database health. And the 3-DNS global area traffi c/application management solution can link data centers globally and load balance global database traffi c. The 3-DNS product incorporates F5 Networks renowned traffic management and content verifi cation, helping enterprises scale globally. When deciding on a data distribution method, the BIG-IP product provides the most choices on the market, no matter which database vendor is being used. Popular methods include diversifying databases to serve non-secure and secure data, diversifying to provide differing Quality of Service levels, and diversifying based on transaction rights. All methods require smart traffi c direction, which is the core strength of the BIG-IP product. The BIG-IP product monitors database health and routes appropriate traffi c based on user-defi ned metrics, all using fast hardware ASICs for industry best transaction numbers. And the newest release of the BIG-IP product can now perform client authentication and authorization to databases to log and discard unauthorized attempts. F5 products are developed with an emphasis on the importance of availability and management. The BIG-IP and 3-DNS products have been proven to integrate with leading software, providing a complete traffi c management and high availability fail-over scheme for local and globally distributed database applications. And with F5’s iControl™ SDK, comprehensive management and integration is greatly simplified.
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