Configuring Load Balancing

When more than one remote peer provides alternative paths to a destination, you can specify preferences among the available routers or enable load balancing for alternatives that have the same lowest cost value. The DLSw router maintains a cache of paired media access control (MAC) address and IP address entries to determine whether an SNA host can reached by means of any of the peers it knows about. There are separate caches for local and remote peers, called the local reachability cache and the remote reachability cache.

To configure DLSw load balancing, include the load-balance statement at the [edit protocols dlsw] hierarchy level:

By default, load balancing is disabled. Load balancing uses the circuit-weight algorithm to make its determinations. This requires that, if there are multiple routes to a destination that share the same lowest cost value, the number of circuits traversing each peer is balanced according to the circuit weight you configure for each peer:

• To configure the circuit cost, or how much preference is attached to establishing a circuit using a peer, include the cost statement at the [edit protocols dlsw remote-peer peer-address] hierarchy level:

  cost cost;

  By default, the cost value is 100. The range is from 0 through 127. The lower the configured cost value, the higher the preference.

• To configure the circuit weight, or the extent to which a peer should participate in establishing circuits, include the circuit-weight statement at the [edit protocols dlsw remote-peer peer-address] hierarchy level:

  circuit-weight weight;

  By default, the circuit-weight value is 1. The range is from 1 through 127. The higher the configured circuit-weight value, the greater the percentage of total circuits established with this remote peer.