Patent attributes
A method, system, and apparatus for managing routing to redundant data centers. Each data center has an associated traffic management device (TMD) that manages traffic with at least one server. The TMDs may determine a priority for the data centers, and advertise that priority, along with other configuration information, to at least one designated router. The configuration information includes a Virtual Internet Protocol (VIP) address that is identical for each of the TMDs. Based on the advertised priorities the designated router routes network traffic to at least one of the data centers. Each TMD monitors a variety of criteria to determine if it is appropriate to change the priority of its associated data center to the designated router. If a data center's priority changes, the associated TMD advertises the change to the designated router, enabling it to dynamically update its routing tables to direct traffic towards a different data center.
