can PIX map many-to-one?

[Bruce Pinsky]

sandy bryant writes:

>
> This is exactly opposite to what it was intended for I know, but can
> I use PIX to map multiple outside addresses to one internal address?
> If so, what happens when I send a packet out from that host - how would
> PIX pick the external address to use?
>

Not that I am aware of...

+-------------------------+-----------------------+---------------------------+
+ || || + + Bruce Pinsky +
+ || || + Cisco Systems, Inc. + Sr. Internetwork Supt Engr+
+ |||| |||| + 170 West Tasman Drive + Phone: (800) 553-24HR +
+ ..:||||||:..:||||||:.. + San Jose, CA 95134 + Fax: (408) 526-8787 +
+ Cisco Systems Inc. + + E-mail: b...@cisco.com +
+-------------------------+-----------------------+---------------------------+
| ** The Science of Networking Networks ** |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Jim Forster]

> This is exactly opposite to what it was intended for I know, but can
> I use PIX to map multiple outside addresses to one internal address?
>

> sandy - trying to avoid multiple NICs/host...

Sandy,

It sounds like what you want will be part of a product we announced
recently, called LocalDirector. See
http://www.cisco.com/warp/customer/146/269.html for the announcement.

> If so, what happens when I send a packet out from that host - how would
> PIX pick the external address to use?

When the TCP sessions are initiated from the outside there is no ambiguity
-- the LocalDirector will re-map outgoing packets so they appear to come
from the same external address the original TCP connection request (SYN
packet) was aimed at.

Following is a brief description of the capability.

I hope this helps.

-- Jim

From: b...@cisco.com
Date: Tue, 9 Apr 1996 06:16:10 EDT
Subject: Re: can PIX map many-to-one?

A new product, called Local-Director, is about to be Beta'ed that
this on a load-sharing basis. The data response times are used
to predict the best target of a set of physical machine for a virtual
machine. We use our Network Address Translation technology to
redirect the connection.

We can also have many virtual address pointed at a single or group
of machines and have the destination port mapped. The port mapping
allows servers to `know' which virtual machine the connection
was thru. The LD could be used to setup thousands of virtual
machine, one for each Web customer, for example, and have the load
for the entire endeavor spread across hundreds of physical machines.

We currently support 1 million (1,000,000) active connections.

Brantley Coile
b...@cisco.com