Manual Chapter : Overview: Diameter

Applies To:

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BIG-IP LTM

  • 16.0.1, 16.0.0
Manual Chapter

Overview: Diameter

Overview: the BIG-IP system implementation of the Diameter-based protocol

The message routing framework (MRF) Diameter solution for the BIG-IP system provides high scalability, availability, and reliability to Diameter proxies. The BIG-IP local traffic manager (LTM) can distribute and balance Diameter traffic among multiple Diameter devices to help maintain availability under high message volumes. Additionally, the Diameter solution can perform advanced health checks on the Diameter devices, routing Diameter clients away from unstable or unreliable devices and provide increased reliability to existing networks.

Diameter message routing configuration

A typical Diameter message routing configuration.
Configuration object
Description
Virtual server
Configures which IP address and port the BIG-IP system will listen on. Objects linked by using a virtual server object: protocol, Session profile, and Router profile.
Session profile
Configures various Diameter options. By linking a session profile to a virtual server, it configures the virtual server to handle Diameter messages.
Static route
Links a Diameter application ID with an origin realm with a destination realm.
Router profile
Links a static route to a virtual server.

Diameter supported protocols

Diameter supports the following protocols in the BIG-IP system.
  • TCP. You can enable TLS.
  • SCTP. You can enable multi-homing.

Diameter supported features

Diameter supports the following features in the BIG-IP system.
Feature
Description
Load Balancing (LB)
Support distributing load across multiple Diameter servers across multiple realms. It can also route based on any AVP value.
High Availability (HA)
Configure in high availability mode where a failure of one chassis will cause the backup chassis to take over.
Persistence
Remembers which Diameter peers are part of a session. Subsequent messages using the same session ID (persistence key) are routed to the alternate peer.
Transformation
Supports modification of Diameter messages (AVP values).
Topology hiding
Support rewriting the Origin Host, Origin Real, Destination Host, Destination Realm.
In-band monitors
Support out-of-band and in-band Diameter monitors.
Connection auto initialization
Configure to connect to a Diameter server before receiving a client connection.
IPv6 support
Full support for IPv6.
Retransmission
Supports retransmission to guarantee the delivery of a Diameter request message.
Loop detection
Supports Diameter loop detection.
Dynamic routing
Supports adding dynamic routes to an MRF Diameter router.
Per peer statistics
Supports collecting Diameter pool member statistics.
TCL context for a message
Supports TCL context for a message.
Diameter in-band monitor
Supports an in-band monitor to mark a pool member down with passive traffic.