Thanks for the clear analogies and breakdown! I’m wondering—if smart routing algorithms (like Least Connections or Weighted Round Robin) already direct traffic to achieve balance, why do we still need to call out Service Distribution as its own objective? In other words, what additional purpose does ‘service distribution’ serve that isn’t already handled by request routing? Would love to hear your take!
If all servers are deployed in a single region (poor distribution), even the smartest routing algorithm can’t survive a regional outage. Service Distribution ensures the system is architected to handle failures and scale, while routing ensures traffic is managed within that architecture.
Service Distribution designs the "map" (where resources live); routing algorithms navigate the "traffic" (how requests flow). Both are critical for scalable, resilient systems.
Thanks for clarifying—my coursework had me equating load balancing solely with real-time request routing, when design-time capacity planning is just as crucial. Viewing service distribution as “load balancing at design time” ensures our routing layer works with a robust, balanced server pool across regions and failure domains. Recognizing service distribution as a core load balancing objective really brings everything into focus. I’ll take that as confirmation I’m on the right track.
Thanks for the clear analogies and breakdown! I’m wondering—if smart routing algorithms (like Least Connections or Weighted Round Robin) already direct traffic to achieve balance, why do we still need to call out Service Distribution as its own objective? In other words, what additional purpose does ‘service distribution’ serve that isn’t already handled by request routing? Would love to hear your take!
If all servers are deployed in a single region (poor distribution), even the smartest routing algorithm can’t survive a regional outage. Service Distribution ensures the system is architected to handle failures and scale, while routing ensures traffic is managed within that architecture.
Service Distribution designs the "map" (where resources live); routing algorithms navigate the "traffic" (how requests flow). Both are critical for scalable, resilient systems.
Thanks for clarifying—my coursework had me equating load balancing solely with real-time request routing, when design-time capacity planning is just as crucial. Viewing service distribution as “load balancing at design time” ensures our routing layer works with a robust, balanced server pool across regions and failure domains. Recognizing service distribution as a core load balancing objective really brings everything into focus. I’ll take that as confirmation I’m on the right track.
Very nicely articulated