What is CDN?
CDN stands for Content Delivery Network. It is a group of geographically distributed servers all over the world that helps in increasing the speed of delivery of web content. Does not matter where you want to access the content it connects you to the closest server so that you can access it easily and fast.
It relies on the process called “caching” It means it stores copies of files in data centers all over the world. It allows you to access it from your nearest server for the fastest speed. By doing this it enables access to such things e.g. downloading software, watching movies, posting anything on social media, checking your information, or any details of any type of organization without waiting to load the content on the web.
You can think of an ATM. It is a perfect example of CDN. Think you want to withdraw or add some money into your bank account and that bank is very far from your address then you have to go there, it will take a lot much time but if there are a lot of ATMs on the way then you can simply go there and get your work done. same a CDN does its job.
Many other companies use it just because of speed and security e.g. Microsoft, Google, Facebook, etc.
Working of CDN
Content Delivery Network depends on main three types of servers. those servers help data or content to reach its destiny.
- Origin Server: It is the main and Original server that contains all the data in it. Whenever any kind of changes is made to the data it updates that first before forwarding it to other servers. It stores all the content before and after of updation. for storing that data it needs the storage that is provided by Amazon’s AWS or Google cloud storage.
- Edge server: The number of edge servers is a lot. It is present everywhere so that it can make a close connection to the user. It stores the temporary copy of the original data that is provided by the Origin server. Then it directly provides that data to the user without any delay as it is the closest server to the user.
- DNS server: It stands for Domain Name System. It always keeps the track of IP address of all the servers. Whenever a client requests access to any kind of data on the Origin server then it responds with another IP address so that the data can be served fast through that IP address.
Benefits of CDN
- Security: CDN provides security to the website mainly for DDoS attacks. It provides the solution for DDoS attacks.
- Availability: It ensures that the data should be provided by the server at any cost. means does not matter how much the traffic is, It will keep updating the data on the web browsers.
- Traffic: All the things are going on online e.g. all the streaming, posting on social media, and watching movies. These all increase traffic on the website, so CDN is high;y skilled in offloading the traffic so that users can access the data without waiting.
- Bandwidth costs: As we know there is an Edge server that delivers the data to the closest client this is the reason it saves so much bandwidth and cost.
- Base of Intelligence: As CDN is all over or all across the world it has all the data and the browsing content from all over. This data can help in the future by providing solutions to the internet world.
- Boost Performace: It helps to deliver the content as fast as possible. It prevents the loading of a web page this is how it increases the performance.
- Improve Customer Experience: By providing the fastest delivery, security, best performance, and loyalty to customers it improves the customer experience.
Who uses CDN
- Everyone used CDN. Those who want to access any content on the internet use CDN.
- For fast delivery of content on the web and for security we use CDN.
- Those who want to improve customer experience and secure their website from DDoS attacks use CDN.
FAQs
1. What is CDN?
CDN stands for Content Delivery Network. It provides the security and fastest delivery of content to the user.
2. What are the components of CDN?
There are three components of CDN. Origin server, Edge server, DNS server. Origin server has all the data it stores all the data by the use of the amazone web service or google cloud service. Edge server is the one who store the copy of data temporarly and send data to the client on the request. DNS is the Domain Name Syatem which tracks the IP address of the user and the server for the website.
3. How CDN boost the performance?
CDN provide the high speed of adata transfer means it deals with buffering and by the use of the Edge server it provides the no delay for data load on the web server.
4. What is the difference between the CDN and cloud computing?
Cloud computing provides computing resourcses e.g. servers, database, applicatoins, networking and virtual things but CDN is the network of the servers that provides the stored content all over the network.
5. What do you mean by CDN host?
It is a service provider that provides the access to content delivery network for content and application. It operates end to end fast, secure, reliable online experience.