Adding a TCP Listener

Scenarios

You can add a TCP listener, if high reliability and high accuracy are required but slow speed is acceptable, for example, during file transfer, email sending and receiving, and remote login.

Constraints

Adding a TCP Listener to a Dedicated Load Balancer

  1. Log in to the management console.
  2. In the upper left corner of the page, click and select the desired region and project.
  3. Click in the upper left corner to display Service List and choose Network > Elastic Load Balancing.
  4. Locate the load balancer and click its name.
  5. Under Listeners, click Add Listener. Configure the parameters based on Table 1.
    Table 1 Parameters for configuring a listener

    Parameter

    Description

    Example Value

    Name

    Specifies the listener name.

    listener-pnqy

    Frontend Protocol

    Specifies the protocol that will be used by the load balancer to receive requests from clients.

    TCP

    Frontend Port

    Specifies the port that will be used by the load balancer to receive requests from clients.

    The port number ranges from 1 to 65535.

    80

    Access Control

    Specifies how access to the listener is controlled. The following options are available (for details, see Access Control):

    • All IP addresses
    • Blacklist
    • Whitelist

    Blacklist

    IP Address Group

    Specifies the IP address group associated with a whitelist or blacklist. If there is no IP address group, create one first. For more information, see Creating an IP Address Group.

    ipGroup-b2

    Transfer Client IP Address

    Specifies whether to transmit IP addresses of the clients to backend servers.

    This function is enabled for dedicated load balancers by default and cannot be disabled.

    N/A

    Advanced Settings

    Idle Timeout

    Specifies the length of time for a connection to keep alive, in seconds. If no request is received within this period, the load balancer closes the connection and establishes a new one with the client when the next request arrives.

    The idle timeout duration ranges from 10 to 4000.

    300

    Tag

    Adds tags to the listener. Each tag is a key-value pair, and the tag key is unique.

    -

    Description

    Provides supplementary information about the listener.

    You can enter a maximum of 255 characters.

    N/A
  6. Click Next: Configure Request Routing Policy to configure the backend server group. For details about how to configure a backend server group, see Table 2.
    Table 2 Parameters for configuring a backend server group

    Parameter

    Description

    Example Value

    Backend Server Group

    Specifies a group of servers with the same features to receive requests from the load balancer. Two options are available:

    • Create new
    • Use existing
      NOTE:

      To associate an existing backend server group, ensure that it is not in use. Select the backend server group with the correct protocol. For example, if the frontend protocol is TCP, the backend protocol must be TCP.

    Create new

    Backend Server Group Name

    Specifies the name of the backend server group.

    server_group

    Backend Protocol

    Specifies the protocol used by backend servers to receive requests.

    The backend protocol is TCP by default and cannot be changed.

    TCP

    Load Balancing Algorithm

    Specifies the algorithm used by the load balancer to distribute traffic. The following options are available:

    • Weighted round robin: Requests are routed to different servers based on their weights, which indicate server processing performance. Backend servers with higher weights receive proportionately more requests, whereas equal-weighted servers receive the same number of requests.
    • Weighted least connections: In addition to the number of active connections established with each backend server, each server is assigned a weight based on their processing capability. Requests are routed to the server with the lowest connections-to-weight ratio.
    • Source IP hash: The source IP address of each request is calculated using the consistent hashing algorithm to obtain a unique hash key, and all backend servers are numbered. The generated key is used to allocate the client to a particular server. This allows requests from different clients to be routed based on source IP addresses and ensures that a client is directed to the same server that it was using previously.
    NOTE:
    • Choose an appropriate algorithm based on your requirements for better traffic distribution.
    • For Weighted round robin or Weighted least connections, no requests will be routed to a server with a weight of 0.

    Weighted round robin

    Sticky Session

    Specifies whether to enable sticky sessions. If you enable sticky sessions, all requests from a client during one session are sent to the same backend server.

    This parameter is optional and can be enabled only if you have selected Weighted round robin for Load Balancing Algorithm.

    N/A

    Sticky Session Type

    Specifies the type of sticky sessions. Source IP address is the only choice available when TCP or UDP is used as the frontend protocol.

    Source IP address: The source IP address of each request is calculated using the consistent hashing algorithm to obtain a unique hashing key, and all backend servers are numbered. The system allocates the client to a particular server based on the generated key. This allows requests from the same IP address to be forwarded to the same backend server.

    Source IP address

    Stickiness Duration (min)

    Specifies the minutes that sticky sessions are maintained. You can enable sticky sessions only if you select Weighted round robin for Load Balancing Algorithm.

    • Stickiness duration at Layer 4: 1 to 60
    • Stickiness duration at Layer 7: 1 to 1440

    20

    Description

    Provides supplementary information about the backend server group.

    You can enter a maximum of 255 characters.

    N/A
  7. Click Next: Add Backend Server. Add backend servers and configure health check for the backend server group. For details about how to add backend servers, see Overview. For details about how to configure health check parameters, see Table 3.
    Table 3 Parameters for configuring a health check

    Parameter

    Description

    Example Value

    Health Check

    Specifies whether to enable health checks.

    If the health check is enabled, click next to Advanced Settings to set health check parameters.

    N/A

    Advanced Settings

    Health Check Protocol

    Specifies the protocol that will be used by the load balancer to check the health of backend servers.

    If the backend protocol is TCP, the health check protocol can be TCP, HTTP, or HTTPS.

    HTTP

    Domain Name

    Specifies the domain name that will be used for health checks. This parameter is available when the health check protocol is HTTP or HTTPS.

    This parameter is left blank by default. A domain name can contain only digits, letters, and hyphens (-) and cannot start with a hyphen (-). A domain name must contain at least two labels separated by periods (.). Each label can contain a maximum of 63 characters, and the total length of a domain name cannot exceed 100 characters.

    www.elb.com

    Health Check Port

    Specifies the port that will be used by the load balancer to check the health of backend servers. The port number ranges from 1 to 65535.

    NOTE:

    This parameter is optional. If you do not specify a health check port, a port of the backend server will be used for health checks by default. If you specify a port, it will be used for health checks.

    80

    Path

    Specifies the health check URL, which is the destination on backend servers for health checks. This parameter is available only when you set the health check protocol to HTTP or HTTPS. The path must start with a slash (/) and can contain 1 to 80 characters.

    The path can contain letters, digits, hyphens (-), slashes (/), periods (.), percent signs (%), ampersands (&), and the following special characters: _~';@$*+,=!:()

    NOTE:

    Example:

    If the URL is http://www.example.com/chat/try/, the health check path is /chat/try/.

    If the URL is http://192.168.63.187:9096/chat/index.html, the health check path is /chat/index.html.

    /index.html

    Interval (s)

    Specifies the maximum time between two consecutive health checks, in seconds.

    The interval ranges from 1 to 50.

    5

    Timeout (s)

    Specifies the maximum time required for waiting for a response from the health check, in seconds. The timeout duration ranges from 1 to 50.

    3

    Maximum Retries

    Specifies the maximum number of health check retries. The value ranges from 1 to 10.

    3
  8. Click Next: Confirm.
  9. Confirm the configuration and click Submit.

Adding a TCP Listener to a Shared Load Balancer

  1. Log in to the management console.
  2. In the upper left corner of the page, click and select the desired region and project.
  3. Click in the upper left corner to display Service List and choose Network > Elastic Load Balancing.
  4. Locate the load balancer and click its name.
  5. Under Listeners, click Add Listener. Configure the parameters based on Table 4.
    Table 4 Parameters for configuring a listener for a shared load balancer

    Parameter

    Description

    Example Value

    Name

    Specifies the listener name.

    listener-pnqy

    Frontend Protocol

    Specifies the protocol that will be used by the load balancer to receive requests from clients.

    TCP

    Frontend Port

    Specifies the port that will be used by the load balancer to receive requests from clients.

    The port number ranges from 1 to 65535.

    80

    Access Control

    Specifies how access to the listener is controlled. The following options are available (for details, see Access Control):

    • All IP addresses
    • Blacklist
    • Whitelist

    Whitelist

    IP Address Group

    Specifies the IP address group associated with a whitelist or blacklist. If there is no IP address group, create one first. For more information, see Creating an IP Address Group.

    ipGroup-b2

    Transfer Client IP Address

    Specifies whether to transmit IP addresses of the clients to backend servers. This parameter is available when the listener protocol is TCP or UDP.

    N/A

    Advanced Settings

    Idle Timeout

    Specifies the length of time for a connection to keep alive, in seconds. If no request is received within this period, the load balancer closes the connection and establishes a new one with the client when the next request arrives.

    The idle timeout duration ranges from 10 to 4000.

    300

    Tag

    Adds tags to the listener. Each tag is a key-value pair, and the tag key is unique.

    -

    Description

    Provides supplementary information about the listener.

    You can enter a maximum of 255 characters.

    N/A
  6. Click Next: Configure Request Routing Policy. Table 5 describes the parameters for configuring a backend server group.
    Table 5 Parameters for adding a backend server group

    Parameter

    Description

    Example Value

    Backend Server Group

    Specifies a group of servers with the same features to receive requests from the load balancer. Two options are available:

    • Create new
    • Use existing
      NOTE:

      To associate an existing backend server group, ensure that it is not in use. Select the backend server group with the correct protocol. For example, if the frontend protocol is TCP, the backend protocol must be TCP.

    Create new

    Backend Server Group Name

    Specifies the name of the backend server group.

    server_group-sq4v

    Backend Protocol

    Specifies the protocol used by backend servers to receive requests.

    The backend protocol is TCP by default and cannot be changed.

    TCP

    Load Balancing Algorithm

    Specifies the algorithm used by the load balancer to distribute traffic. The following options are available:

    • Weighted round robin: Requests are routed to different servers based on their weights, which indicate server processing performance. Backend servers with higher weights receive proportionately more requests, whereas equal-weighted servers receive the same number of requests.
    • Weighted least connections: This algorithm is designed based on the least connections algorithm that uses the number of active connections to each backend server to make its load balancing decision. In addition to the number of connections, each server is assigned a weight based on its capacity. Requests are routed to the server with the lowest connections-to-weight ratio.
    • Source IP hash: The source IP address of each request is calculated using the consistent hashing algorithm to obtain a unique hash key, and all backend servers are numbered. The generated key allocates the client to a particular server. This allows requests from different clients to be routed based on source IP addresses and ensures that a client is directed to the same server that it was using previously.
    NOTE:
    • Choose an appropriate algorithm based on your requirements for better traffic distribution.
    • For Weighted round robin or Weighted least connections, no requests will be routed to a server with a weight of 0.

    Weighted round robin

    Sticky Session

    Specifies whether to enable sticky sessions. If you enable sticky sessions, all requests from a client during one session are sent to the same backend server.

    NOTE:

    You can enable sticky sessions only if you have selected Weighted round robin for Load Balancing Algorithm.

    N/A

    Sticky Session Type

    Specifies the type of sticky sessions. Source IP address is the only choice available when TCP or UDP is used as the frontend protocol.

    Source IP address: The source IP address of each request is calculated using the consistent hashing algorithm to obtain a unique hashing key, and all backend servers are numbered. The system allocates the client to a particular server based on the generated key. This allows requests from the same IP address to be forwarded to the same backend server.

    Source IP address

    Stickiness Duration (min)

    Specifies the minutes that sticky sessions are maintained. You can enable sticky sessions only if you select Weighted round robin for Load Balancing Algorithm.

    • Stickiness duration at Layer 4: 1 to 60
    • Stickiness duration at Layer 7: 1 to 1440

    20

    Description

    Provides supplementary information about the backend server group.

    You can enter a maximum of 255 characters.

    N/A
  7. Click Next: Add Backend Server. Add backend servers and configure health check for the backend server group. For details about how to add backend servers, see Overview. For details about how to configure health check parameters, see Table 6.
    Table 6 Parameters for configuring a health check

    Parameter

    Description

    Example Value

    Health Check

    Specifies whether to enable health checks.

    If the health check is enabled, click next to Advanced Settings to set health check parameters.

    N/A

    Advanced Settings

    Health Check Protocol

    Specifies the protocol that will be used by the load balancer to check the health of backend servers. There are two options: TCP and HTTP.

    HTTP

    Domain Name

    Specifies the domain name that will be used for health checks.

    This parameter is available when you set the health check protocol to HTTP.

    • You can use the private IP address of the backend server as the domain name.
    • You can also specify a domain name that consists of at least two labels separated by periods (.). Use only letters, digits, and hyphens (-). Do not start or end strings with a hyphen. Max total: 100 characters. Max label: 63 characters.

    www.elb.com

    Health Check Port

    Specifies the port that will be used by the load balancer to check the health of backend servers. The port number ranges from 1 to 65535.

    NOTE:

    This parameter is optional. If you do not specify a health check port, a port of the backend server will be used for health checks by default.

    80

    Path

    Specifies the health check URL, which is the destination on backend servers for health checks. This parameter is available only when the health check protocol is HTTP. The path must start with a slash (/) and can contain 1 to 80 characters.

    The path can contain letters, digits, hyphens (-), slashes (/), periods (.), percent signs (%), ampersands (&), and the following special characters: _~';@$*+,=!:()

    NOTE:

    Example:

    If the URL is http://www.example.com/chat/try/, the health check path is /chat/try/.

    If the URL is http://192.168.63.187:9096/chat/index.html, the health check path is /chat/index.html.

    /index.html

    Interval (s)

    Specifies the maximum time between two consecutive health checks, in seconds.

    The interval ranges from 1 to 50.

    5

    Timeout (s)

    Specifies the maximum time required for waiting for a response from the health check, in seconds. The timeout duration ranges from 1 to 50.

    3

    Maximum Retries

    Specifies the maximum number of health check retries. The value ranges from 1 to 10.

    3
  8. Click Next: Confirm.
  9. Confirm the configuration and click Submit.
Parent topic: Listener