【Table of contents】

1. 1. Overview
2. 2. What is AWS?
3. 3. What is ALB?
   • a) Features available in ALB
   • b) Benefits of ALB (ELB)
4. 4. Conclusion

• 1. Overview

  More and more companies are using AWS, the web service that Amazon.com is famous for providing, but it can be difficult to get all the benefits of all the features right and use them within your business.
  In this article, we'll focus on one of the attractions of AWS, "ALB," and check out the details of its features.
  If you're a company that's about to use AWS, or if you're just starting out with AWS, check out this overview of how to get the best out of ALB.

• 2. What is AWS?

  AWS stands for "Amazon Web Services" and is a proprietary cloud computing service provided by Amazon.com, known for its e-commerce sites.
  With so many industries requiring IT infrastructure, advanced data handling and efficient digital operations becoming more commonplace, AWS can be a game-changer for your business, as it has a number of useful web features.
  AWS services offer the benefits of simplicity and efficiency, high security, fault tolerance, and high availability, all of which make it possible to modernize your system.
  For companies that are experiencing inconvenience and limitations in the way they work today, embracing AWS is a great way to make a difference.

  AWS is already being used by enterprises around the world, supporting a wide range of businesses with numerous regions and availability zones.
  It is characterized by a wide range of applications, including application services, IoT, AI, security, and data management.
  Companies that don't use much IT and can't imagine the benefits of cloud computing can also benefit from it, and AWS is likely to continue to expand its partnerships.

• 3. What is ALB?

  In AWS, which is becoming an indispensable service in the world, "ALB" is a service that is necessary to distribute access from the web.
  ALB is an abbreviation for "Application Load Balancer" and refers to a load balancing service with high functionality.
  When a web site has a large number of accesses, the server can no longer handle all the accesses, causing problems such as the inability to open pages.
  These phenomena will always be a problem that disrupts your business schedule because you will not be able to provide the services that you ideally want.
  To avoid such risks, a load balancer function such as ALB is used to distribute the load on the website.
  Using a load balancer, you can distribute the load across multiple servers to avoid page stoppages and unstable processing, thus increasing the stability of your web services.
  If you're thinking about continuing to develop your web services, we recommend implementing ALB.

  ALB works in Layer 7 of the application layer in Open System Interconnection (OSI).
  It is characterized by content-based routing that distributes the load on the website by referring to information such as HTTP and HTTPS headers and selecting the most effective method.
  Compared to the old support features provided by AWS, it is much more functional and more convenient to use.
  In particular, if your web application supports HTTPS, the use of ALB will be recommended.

  • a) Features available in ALB

    The ALB has the following features, each of which provides benefits to the business.

    Routing based on URLs is possible
    Since ALBs can be routed based on website URLs, multiple services can be configured independently for optimal requests.
    Applications can be configured in small sizes and each request can be routed to its own target group.
    Furthermore, it is said that there will be more ways to configure routing in the future, so you can expect to have higher functionality.

    Supports container-based applications
    The ALB also provides extensive support for containerized applications.
    It works with Amazon EC2 Container Service (ECS) for complete container management, including detailed health checks and the ability to connect containers to target groups.

    Added support for WebSocket and HTTP/2
    The ALB supports WebSocket and HTTP/2.
    It is characterized by the ability to handle multiple requests on the connection and allow for long hours of use.

  • b) Benefits of the ALB (ELB)

    AWS provides load balancing services, including ALB with various functions, as Elastic Load Balancing (ELB).
    By using AWS load balancers, your business will benefit from the following

    Achieving High Availability
    A load balancer allows you to operate your web services with high availability.
    Targets include Amazon EC2 instances, containers, IP addresses, and more to help you receive traffic.
    In addition, it can be load balanced within a region and is routed to healthy targets in different availability zones.

    Robust security features
    Since ALB is placed in the Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC), you can use the Security Group feature to set up a secure configuration so that only the necessary traffic passes through.
    In addition to the ALB, AWS's security features such as SSL/TLS certificate management, user authentication, and logging can be combined to provide a more secure service operation.

    Flexibility to change
    The flexibility of application targeting also allows you to route more applications on the same instance. The ability to group target applications individually while using the same network port makes inter-application communication in microservice-based architectures simpler than ever before.

    Real-time monitoring and auditing
    Another benefit is the ability to see the status and performance of your application in real time using Amazon CloudWatch metrics, logging, request tracking, and more.
    It allows you to check detailed data in your application, allowing you to pursue the cause of problems and determine what hurting performance on a per-request basis is.

• 4. Conclusion

  There are various services in AWS, but among them, ALB is one of the most important services that you should check out, as it is the basis of web services.
  The use of ALBs will provide stability to your web services and flexibility in your operation environment.

  In addition to ALBs, AWS has two load balancers, Network Load Balancer and Classic Load Balancer, which are summarized as ELBs.
  Each one has its own characteristics and advantages, so it is recommended to check them together.