Can one instance of a WCF service pass work on to another instance where this 2nd instance would reply directly to the requester?

Question

Let's say I have 2 instances of the same web services.

Is there a way that I can have the second instance of the web service perform a task at the behest of the first instance of the WCF service and reply directly to the original requester? I could code this and include logic in WCF-A to contact WCF-B under the right conditions and then passback the result, but returning to the requester directly from WCF-B would be easier.

Also, I made a handy dandy chart.

Answer 1

I presume A and B are on different servers? In that case Network Load Balancing would be the most natural choice for load distribution. It's a free part of Windows Server. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb742455.aspx

Alternatively you could look at Routing Services. Routing services allows you to redirect "any" request based on filter rules. Place a Routing Service where the client expects "WCF-A", create a custom filter that will decide when to route to the real "WCF-A" or when to redirect to "WCF-B".

Here's some resources: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee517422.aspx The samples are the best introduction: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=35ec8682-d5fd-4bc3-a51a-d8ad115a8792