Abstract: A load-balancer assigns incoming requests to servers at a server farm. An atomic operation assigns both un-encrypted clear-text requests and encrypted requests from a client to the same server at the server farm. An encrypted session is started early by the atomic operation, before encryption is required. The atomic operation is initiated by a special, automatically loaded component on a web page. This component is referenced by code requiring that an encrypted session be used to retrieve the component. Keys and certificates are exchanged between a server and the client to establish the encrypted session. The server generates a secure-sockets-layer (SSL) session ID for the encrypted session. The server also generates a server-assignment cookie that identifies the server at the server farm. The server-assignment cookie is encrypted and sent to the client along with the SSL session ID. The Client decrypts the server-assignment cookie and stores it along with the SSL session ID.

Abstract: A load-balancer assigns incoming requests to servers at a server farm. An atomic operation assigns both un-encrypted clear-text requests and encrypted requests from a client to the same server at the server farm. An encrypted session is started early by the atomic operation, before encryption is required. The atomic operation is initiated by a special, automatically loaded component on a web page. This component is referenced by code requiring that an encrypted session be used to retrieve the component. Keys and certificates are exchanged between a server and the client to establish the encrypted session. The server generates a secure-sockets-layer (SSL) session ID for the encrypted session. The server also generates a server-assignment cookie that identifies the server at the server farm. The server-assignment cookie is encrypted and sent to the client along with the SSL session ID. The Client decrypts the server-assignment cookie and stores it along with the SSL session ID.

Abstract: An optimal path through the Internet to a client is determined by the server during connection establishment. During the 3-way handshake that establishes a connection, a web server ordinarily sends a single SYN+ACK packet to the client. Instead of sending just one SYN+ACK packet, the server is modified to send multiple SYN+ACK packets, each using a different path to the client. When the multiple SYN+ACK packets are sent from the server at the same time, the first packet that reaches the client used the fastest path through the Internet. The client responds to this first SYN+ACK packet with an ACK packet back to the server. The other SYN+ACK packets that use slower paths arrive at the client after the first SYN+ACK packet and are ignored by the client as being out-of-order. The server includes a different sequence number with each SYN+ACK packet. The client increments this sequence number and includes the incremented sequence number in the ACK packet.

Abstract: A client-side dispatcher resides on a client machine below high-level client applications and TCP/IP layers. The client-side dispatcher performs TCP state migration to relocate the client-server TCP connection to a new server by storing packets locally and later altering them before transmission. The client-side dispatcher operates in several modes. In an error-recovery mode, when a server fails, error packets from the server are intercepted by the client-side dispatcher. Stored connection packet's destination addresses are changed to an address of a relocated server. The altered packets then establish a connection with the relocated server. Source addresses of packets from the server are changed to that of the original server that crashed so that the client application is not aware of the error. In a delayed URL-based dispatch mode, the client-side dispatcher intercepts connection packets before they are sent over the network.