System components
The SteelHead SaaS system consists of these components:
• SaaS Application - The application delivered as Software as a Service.
• Akamai Intelligent Platform - The Akamai distributed network of more than 100,000 servers deployed in more than 1000 locations world-wide across the public internet. The platform hosts Riverbed SteelHead technology and provides internet-based optimization for Enterprise SaaS traffic.
• Akamai SureRoute Optimization - Akamai SureRoute Optimization uses a suite of technologies to provide fast and reliable delivery between the Akamai Edge Servers. Route optimization examines multiple paths across the internet to find the fastest path and route past any failures; the Enhanced Akamai Protocol overcomes the inefficiencies of TCP to provide the highest throughput and fastest recovery; and Packet Redundancy enables you to re-create any lost data without having the client or server retransmit.
• Akamai Edge Server - The Akamai Edge Server in the Akamai Intelligent Platform closest to the end user is dynamically and intelligently selected (regardless of whether the end-user location has direct internet access or the data is back-hauled to the internet gateway at the data center). The Akamai Edge Server closest to the SaaS application runs a RiOS instance, referred to in this system as the Akamai Cloud SteelHead, which acts as a peer to the registered appliance.
• Data Center SteelHead - The SteelHead appliance located in the customer data center close to the customer’s internet egress point. It contains the Akamai Cloud Proxy (ACP) feature.
ACP is a software component that grants the SteelHead appliance access to the Akamai Intelligent Platform. The data center SteelHead appliance connects to the Akamai Intelligent Platform using a configurable UDP port over a wide range of IP addresses.
• Branch SteelHead - The SteelHead appliance located in the customer branch office that intercepts any connections destined for the SaaS platform to be accelerated. The Enterprise Branch SteelHead can host the Akamai Cloud Proxy (ACP) feature, but does not require it.
• Akamai Cloud SteelHead (ACSH) - A SteelHead unique to each customer dynamically created and managed in the Akamai network based on SaaS traffic from the customer’s branch office locations.
• Riverbed Cloud Portal - An always-on, always-available web portal that enables you to manage your SteelHead SaaS services and your branch appliances.
Note: The Riverbed Cloud Portal uses elastic scaling technology. As a result, the portal is not always served from a static IP address. Ensure that all appliances that you want to communicate with the Riverbed Cloud Portal are configured to use DNS and hostnames for the portal.