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How to route an Additional IP

Stephanie R.
Updated

Learn how to use the Additional IP with the OVHcloud Load Balancer service.

An Additional IP is an IP address that can be switched from one service to another. This capability helps you maintain infrastructure continuity by mitigating issues such as hardware failures, service overload, or maintenance downtime.

For more information on Additional IPs, see our webpage.

The OVHcloud Load Balancer solution offers load balancing features for various protocols, including HTTP, HTTPS, and TCP. Linking it to an Additional IP provides the ability to switch over your existing infrastructure to a Load Balancer without service interruption. Since you continue using the Additional IP, you avoid the need to change your public IP address and wait for DNS zone propagation. Using an Additional IP means that you avoid the need to change your service's IP address, and no longer have to wait for your DNS zone to propagate changes.

For more information on the OVH Load Balancer solution, you can read our Introduction to the OVHcloud Load Balancer.

 

Requirements

Required Load Balancer configuration:

Once you have confirmed the changes in the list of Additional IPs associated with the Load Balancer, you need to be able to refresh them. Several conditions need to be met for this to work.

  • If the Load Balancer is in a vRack, all of the server clusters must also be in the vRack. The Load Balancer must also have its vLAN. Otherwise, there should not be any clusters in a vRack.
  • At least one existing front-end. All of the front-ends must be valid. They can be enabled and disabled, with either:
  • a valid route (with routing rules)
  • a redirection (redirectLocation)
  • a default server cluster
  • Nothing else should be refreshed for the Load Balancer. A Load Balancer cannot be refreshed several times at once. Doing so would not make any changes to the resulting configuration.

 

Instructions

In this document, we will look at two distinct uses:

  • linking an Additional IP to the OVHcloud Load Balancer service
  • linking an Additional IP to a single front-end of the OVHcloud Load Balancer service

 

Add an Additional IP to the OVHcloud Load Balancer

You can link these IPs to your OVHcloud Load Balancer via the OVHcloud API using this call:

POST /ip/{ip}/move

You can then list the Additional IPs linked to your OVH Load Balancer with the following API call:

GET /ipLoadbalancing/{serviceName}/failover

The Additional IPs linked to your Load Balancer are available for all of your front-ends. This differs from the next case, where an Additional IP is linked to a single front-end.

 

Add a dedicated Additional IP to a front-end

Regardless of the front-end type, you can define a list of dedicated Additional IPs to be linked to it. In this specific case, your Additional IP will be attached to a single front-end. As a result, it will only grant access to the service provided by that front-end. Services for your other front-ends will remain accessible via your IP Load Balancer’s primary IP address.

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If you are creating a front-end:

From the OVHcloud API, you can use the following call to define one or more Additional IPs on a front-end as you create it:

 

If you are updating an existing front-end:

From the OVHcloud API, you can use the following call to define one or more Additional IPs on an existing front-end:

You can define dedicated Additional IPs via the OVHcloud Control Panel by going to the Bare Metal Cloud section, then Load Balancer.

Once you have selected the Load Balancer you want to modify, navigate to the Front-ends tab, where you can create a new front-end or edit an existing one.

In Advanced settings, you can select the Additional IPs you would like to add to your front-end.

IPLB_frontend_advancedSettings.png

Once the front-end has been configured, click Add or Modify, depending on whether you are configuring a new or existing front-end.

Please remember to deploy the configuration. There are two ways of doing this:

  • via the Status section of the OVHcloud Control Panel, by clicking on your Load Balancer’s more options ... button, then selecting Apply configuration.
  • via the reminder box in the OVHcloud Control Panel, notifying you that the configuration has not been applied, by clicking Apply configuration.

IPLB_applyConfiguration_banner.png

 

Go further

For more information and tutorials, please see our other OVHcloud Load Balancer guides or explore the guides for other OVHcloud products and services.

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