The Hetzner Cloud network stack – history and technical overview
Hetzner provides a technical overview of its cloud network stack, emphasizing a design that prioritizes host-based network functions over complex physical hardware. This approach allows for greater flexibility, easier maintenance, and improved isolation of network errors.
Why it matters
It offers insight into the infrastructure strategies used by cloud providers to maintain scalability and reliability.
All cloud products require versatile and reliable connectivity options, so that our customers and potentially their customers can reach the services running in our network.
At Hetzner, we generally believe in solutions we own and can operate ourselves, and in having building blocks, where we can further build upon. The network, and especially the network connectivity for our cloud offerings, is no different.
Although technologies changed over the years, we’ve always preferred solutions, where the moving parts are on the hosts, rather than having a smart and complex physical network setup. As a result, we designed the setup in a way, that the physical network is providing stable IP connectivity to the hosts, and the hosts offer higher level network functions. These include Firewalls, Private Networks, and auxiliary infrastructure services.
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