Interconnect Layer

Learn about interconnect layer schema, solutions at different scales of organization and problems with reconfigurations.

Interconnect layer

In the previous chapter, we looked at instances running on machines. But really, who is interested in a single instance running by itself? A standalone process might as well be on a desert island. We need to connect them together into a system. This chapter continues our iterative zoom-out to look at how the instances work together and find each other, as well as how callers invoke them. It’s time to look at the interconnect layer from our schematic (shown in the following figure).

Schema Layers

Operations

Security, availability, capacity, status, communication 

Control Plane

System monitoring, deployment, anomaly detection, features 

Interconnect

Routing, load balancing, failover, traffic management 

Instances

Services, processes, components, instance monitoring 

Foundation

Hardware, VMs, IP addresses, physical network 

The interconnect layer covers all the mechanisms that knit a bunch of instances together into a cohesive system. That includes traffic management, load balancing, and discovery. The interconnect layer is ...