Microsoft® Lync Server 2010 Unleashed

External Access

Another strong benefit of using a Director is its capability to serve as a barrier between internal pools and external traffic. To understand the benefit, note that Edge Servers do not authenticate external user requests across the Internet and merely pass traffic to an internal server to handle authentication. Without a Director, external traffic authenticates by a Front End pool, or, in other words, anonymous Internet traffic is allowed to communicate with an internal domain member server.

Instead of allowing authentication requests from an Edge Server to pass directly to a Front End pool, a Director can be placed between a communication path to authenticate users before external traffic reaches a Front End Server. In situations ...