| Although this book is designed to be read from cover-to-cover, it was also developed so that you can easily jump between its parts, chapters, and sections, enabling you to concentrate on only those topics that require your focused attention. As mentioned previously, both application- and network-centric professionals will learn a great deal about their IT counterpart's native technologies. By allowing the reader to effectively concentrate on particular areas, this book benefits readers from diverse technical backgrounds. Chapter 1 provides an introduction to content networking. Chapters 2 through 9 are framed as background chapters to content networking, giving a detailed examination of both the fundamentals of networks and applications. Chapters 10 through 14 are the core content networking chapters, with each Chapter providing a detailed treatment of a particular subtechnology of content networking. If you intend to read all the chapters, the order in the book is an excellent sequence to use. The chapters of this book cover the following topics: Chapter 1, "Introducing Content Networking" This Chapter offers general insight into the broad topic of content networking, including its purpose, goals, and subtechnologies. Chapter 2, "Exploring the Network Layers" This Chapter examines Layers 1 through 4 of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) reference model, giving approximately equal coverage on each layer. To glue the layers together, this Chapter ends with an illustration of a sample application flow, showing how the layers interact with one another. Chapter 3, "Introducing Switching, Routing, and Address Translation" This Chapter introduces how frames are switched by Layer 2 switches, how packets are routed and switched by Layer 3 routers, and how the transport segment's IP addresses and port numbers are translated by Layer 4 content switches and firewalls. Chapter 4, "Exploring Security Technologies and Network Infrastructure Designs" This Chapter covers major topics for securing your applications and network, such as packet filtering, application inspection, and encryption, and provides design backdrops for common networking infrastructures, including WANs, campuses, and Internet Content Delivery Networks (ICDN). Chapter 5, "IP Multicast Content Delivery" Streaming media and content distribution can consume a great deal of network bandwidth. To deal with this issue, Chapter 5 provides a way to minimize potential flooding using IP multicast. Chapter 6, "Ensuring Content Delivery with Quality of Service" This Chapter provides a way to minimize the impact of packet loss, delay, and jitter by enabling QoS features in your network. Chapter 7, "Presenting and Transforming Content" This Chapter covers how to use Extensible Markup Language (XML)-based markup laguages for describing, presenting, and transforming content. Chapter 8, "Exploring the Application Layer" This Chapter introduces the application layer and in particular the protocols that pertain to content networking concepts discussed throughout the book, including HTTP, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), and FTP application layer protocols. Chapter 9, "Introducing Streaming Media" This Chapter covers streaming media concepts, including how video on demand (VoD), live, and rebroadcast events are delivered using Real-Time Transport Protocol (RTP), Real-Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP), and Motion Picture Expert Group (MPEG) protocols. This Chapter also compares and contrasts Microsoft Windows, Apple QuickTime, and RealNetworks streaming technologies. Chapter 10, "Exploring Server Load Balancing" This Chapter shows how to design redundancy and high availability into your server farms by configuring load distribution algorithms, health checks, session persistence, and Layer 57 load balancing on your content switches. Chapter 11, "Switching Secured Content" This Chapter shows how to switch and offload encrypted content by importing, creating, and configuring certificates and keys in SSL termination devices, such as the Content Switching Module (CSM) with Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) daughter cards (CSM-S) and the Content Services Switch (CSS) SSL modules. Chapter 12, "Exploring Global Server Load Balancing" This Chapter shows how to design redundancy and high availability across your sites, using the Domain Name System (DNS), Distributed Director, proximity-based load balancing, and global sticky databases. Chapter 13, "Delivering Cached and Streaming Media" This Chapter examines how to configure your routers with Web Cache Control Protocol (WCCP) and content switches to switch requests to Content Engines (CE) for serving frequently requested objects. These frequently requested objects can include the following: HTTP and streaming media; standard caching services, such as web and reverse-proxy caching on your CEs using the Application and Content Networking System (ACNS); value-added services, such as content authentication and content preloading; and content freshness from CEs. Chapter 14, "Distributing and Routing Managed Content" This Chapter explores how to configure ACNS for content distribution and routing serivces, by configuring channels of CEs, forwarding content to those channels, and using content request routing technologies, such as simplified hybrid routing and dynamic proxy auto-configuration, to route client's requests for the distributed content.
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