Summary
In this chapter, we explored how LBs help applications scale and provide resilience. They tend to fall into two categories, either Layer 7 or Layer 4 LBs. Layer 7 LBs, which normally work on HTTP, understand protocol-specific attributes such as paths or headers, whereas L4 LBs work at the port level and are protocol-agnostic.
We also reviewed the differences between the proxy and DSR modes; a proxy LB always sits between the client and the backend system, whereas in DSR mode, the backend can return traffic directly to the client (albeit by faking the source address to be that of the LB).
We reviewed the different types of ELBs typically used with EKS, namely the ALB and NLB, and how they differ. We then learned how to install the ALBC on an EKS cluster and then how you can use annotations and custom configuration to create either an NLB or ALB and register Pods with them so you can access the service based on the path (ALB) or ports (NLB).
Finally, we quickly reviewed...