AX Series for the Blackboard Learn Platform

The AX Series is a 64-bit, feature-rich, new generation Application Delivery Controller (ADC), featuring the Advanced Core Operating System (ACOS). ACOS guarantees extra head room to accommodate traffic surges, intensive Layer 7 application inspection and future traffic growth.

• Application Delivery, Load Balancing and Availability
• Application Acceleration and Offload
• Application Security

Together, Blackboard and the AX Series ensure the most responsive and optimized Learning Management System (LMS).

Application Delivery, Load Balancing and Availability

Ensuring application availability is key to user application adoption and retention.

The AX Series offers:

• LMS internal communication between Blackboard components using Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA)/Internet Inter-ORB Protocol (IIOP) to eliminate hard coded, single points of failure
• Health checks, scripted or built-in, to ensure only valid servers issue content, instantly
• Load balancing for optimal traffic distribution to multiple Web servers
• Global Server Load Balancing (GSLB) for site failover

With AX Series availability options, users can access data, seamlessly, in spite of server or application outages.

Acceleration and Offload

In order to ensure efficient application delivery, connections require transmitted data to be optimized and computationally intensive functions to be offloaded from the Blackboard Web servers. The AX Series sits between the student and the Blackboard server farm, offering:

• SSL ASIC based bulk decryption offload
• RAM Caching for static and dynamic content serving of frequently requested objects
• Hardware- or software-based HTTP compression offl oad to reduce data transfer size
• TCP Optimization with connection reuse
• Flexible Layer 7 application traffic control
  • "Find and replace" for content, for example HTTP to HTTPS link conversion in content
  • aFleX scripting to inspect or adjust traffic in the header or payload

aFleX scripting is a versatile tool for administrators, as it can solve complex issues today, but importantly those that may come in the future. For example, aFleX can recognize specific browsers, content types and languages for custom load balancing decisions.

Security

The AX Series can act as a full proxy between the clients and the Web servers. All TCP connections are terminated at the AX Series, ensuring all connections on the back end are initiated from the AX.

In this process the AX Series eliminates various attacks such as Denial of Service (DoS) attacks and other network level attacks. Access Control Lists (ACLs), connection limits and connection rate limits can be used to control traffic.

aFleX scripting is also applicable for security functions. For example, if an attack is in progress and no vendor security update is available, aFleX can be used to search and then identify packets that match an element of the specific attack payload, then mitigate it by dropping the traffic.

Summary

The AX Series with Blackboard Learn offers a proven, compatible and cost effective solution to LMS deployments. Backed by first class support and maximum flexibility deployment, issues can be solved quickly.

With an all inclusive price, and no additional licensing, organizations can be sure of head room for traffic growth well into the future, without having to earmark additional funds to upgrade software.