Chapter 1 Introduction to Policies and Expressions 3
•Bindings. To ensure that the NetScaler can invoke a policy when it is
needed, you associate the policy, or bind it, to one or more bind points.
You can bind a policy globally or to a virtual server. For more information,
see “About Policy Bindings,” on page 7.
•An associated action. An action is a separate entity from a policy. Policy
evaluation ultimately results in the NetScaler performing an action.
For example, a policy in the Integrated Cache can identify HTTP requests
for .gif or .jpeg files. An action that you associate with this policy
determines that the responses to these types of requests are served from the
cache.
For some features, you configure actions as part of a more complex set of
instructions known as a profile. For more information, see “Order of
Evaluation Based on Traffic Flow,” on page 9.
How Different NetScaler Features Use Policies
The NetScaler supports a variety of features that rely on policies for operation.
The following table summarizes how the NetScaler features use policies:
NetScaler Feature, Policy Type, and Policy Usage
Feature Name Policy Type How You Use Policies in the Feature
System Classic For the Authentication function, policies contain
authentication schemes for different
authentication methods.
For example, you can configure LDAP and
certificate-based authentication schemes.
You also configure policies in the Auditing
function.
DNS Advanced To determine how to perform DNS resolution for
requests.
SSL Classic To determine when to apply an encryption
function and add certificate information to clear
text.
To provide end-to-end security, after a message is
decrypted, the SSL feature re-encrypts clear text
and uses SSL to communicate with Web servers.
Compression Classic and
Advanced To determine what type of traffic is compressed.
Integrated
Caching Advanced To determine whether HTTP responses are
cacheable.
Responder Advanced To configure the behavior of the Responder
function.