Patent ID: 8688817

Claim:
A method for handing-off a network connection in a server farm comprising at least one director, a set of servers, and a set of transformation agents that is associated with the set of servers, the method comprising: establishing a first network connection for facilitating intercommunication between said director and a client using a first set of state parameters; processing at said director, a content request that is received over the first network connection from the client, wherein processing the content request comprises using a routing procedure to select a particular server from the set of servers that is responsible for hosting content that is requested in the content request; passing, from the director to a transformation agent that is associated with the particular server, a connection hand-off request comprising the first set of state parameters and said content request, said passing of the connection hand-off request conducted using a connectionless oriented protocol; completing hand-off of the first network connection from the director to the transformation agent as a result of the passing of the connection hand-off request and a reply to the connection hand-off request; and performing transformations at the transformation agent using the first set of state parameters provided in the connection hand-off request, wherein performing the transformations comprises transforming (i) a second set of state parameters for packets encapsulating the requested content passing over a second network connection established between the transformation agent and a protocol stack of the particular server to (ii) said first set of state parameters for passage of said packets from the transformation agent to the client over the first network connection.