Learn how to use the Additional IP with the OVH Load Balancer service.
An Additional IP is an IP address that can be switched from one service to another. In doing so, it helps you avoid a wide range of issues for your infrastructure (hardware failures, overload for your services, maintenance, etc.).
For more information on Additional IPs, see our webpage.
The OVHcloud Load Balancer solution offers load-balancing features for a range of different protocols: HTTP, HTTPS, and TCP. When you link it to an Additional IP, you can switch over your existing infrastructure to a Load Balancer without disturbing or interrupting services for your customers. Effectively, you will not need to change the IP address any longer if you are still using the Additional IP, so you will not need to wait for your DNS zone to propagate any changes.
For more information on the OVH Load Balancer solution, you can read our Introduction to the OVHcloud Load Balancer.
Requirements
- a correctly configured OVHcloud Load Balancer
- an Additional IP
The 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
You can link these IPs to your OVHcloud Load Balancer via the OVHcloud API. The API call for this is as follows:
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 will be available for all of your front-ends. This is contrary to the following case, in which we will link an Additional IP to a single front-end.
Dedicated Additional IP
No matter what kind of front-end you wish to use, you can define a list of dedicated Additional IPs that will be linked to them. Please note that in this particular case, your Additional IP will be attached to only one single front-end. As a result, it will only give access to the service provided by this front-end. The services for your other front-ends will be accessible via your IP Load Balancer’s IP address.
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:
- HTTP protocol
POST /ipLoadbalancing/{serviceName}/http/frontend
- TCP protocol
POST /ipLoadbalancing/{serviceName}/tcp/frontend
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:
- HTTP protocol
PUT /ipLoadbalancing/{serviceName}/http/frontend/{frontendId}
- TCP protocol
PUT /ipLoadbalancing/{serviceName}/tcp/frontend/{frontendId}
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, 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.
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
Statussection of the OVHcloud Control Panel, by clicking on your Load Balancer’s more options...button, then selectingApply configuration. -
via the reminder box in the OVHcloud Control Panel, notifying you that the configuration has not been applied, by clicking
Apply configuration.
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.