Reverse Proxy
A reverse proxy is a server that sits between client devices and backend servers, forwarding client requests to appropriate servers and returning responses. It handles tasks like load balancing, SSL termination, caching, and security filtering, acting as an intermediary to optimize and protect web applications. This architecture improves performance, scalability, and security by managing traffic before it reaches application servers.
Developers should use a reverse proxy when deploying web applications to distribute traffic across multiple servers, offload SSL encryption, cache static content, and protect against attacks like DDoS. It's essential for high-availability setups, microservices architectures, and scenarios requiring centralized logging or authentication, such as in cloud deployments or containerized environments.