Applications

Applications is an Azion product that allows you to build applications that run in Azion’s infrastructure. By reducing latency and enhancing throughput, Applications optimizes your end-user experience by bringing your application closer to them.

By operating on a reverse proxy architecture, Applications allows you to create applications on the edge and direct traffic from your domain to Azion. Through this process, your users can access your application via a highly distributed global network of edge nodes. Then, Azion selects which edge node closest to the user can handle the request.

Your content or application must be served from one or more origins. An origin, also called your applications backend, can be made up of one or more web servers in your infrastructure, a cloud service, or Object Storage. Connector is used to connect to these origin sources. For more information, see the Connector reference. With Applications, you can:

Define how your content will be cached.
Execute functions at the edge.
Bring your business rules for any request or response.
Optimize content and image delivery for your users.

Build your first application

You can create and manage applications using:

Implementation

Scope	Resource
Applications first steps	First steps
Clone an application	How to clone an application
Delete an application	How to delete an application
Applications Main Settings	Main Settings
Applications Cache Settings	Cache Settings
Get to know Functions	Functions Instances
Get to know Device Groups	Device Groups
Get to know Workloads	Workloads
Get to know Connector	Connector
Get to know Real-Time Purge	Real-Time Purge
Rules Engine for Applications	Rules Engine

Modules

Modules can complement your implementation of Applications. You can enable or disable modules in the Main Settings tab of your application, provided your account supports them and there are no existing dependencies upon deactivation.

See the documentation for each module:

Module	Description
Application Accelerator	Optimize API protocols and manage dynamic content delivery to accelerate applications and APIs.
Cache	Configure cache settings to speed up the delivery of static and dynamic content.
Functions	Build ultra-low latency applications and customize content delivery.
Image Processor	Optimize image processing for various devices, browsers, and screen resolutions.
Tiered Cache	Add a cache layer between your users and the edge to keep objects in cache for longer periods of time.

Advanced settings

Applications lets you manage caching, functions, and other settings. These capabilities help you optimize content delivery for better performance and user experience.

See the documentation for each available setting:

Setting	Description
Main Settings	Manage modules like Application Accelerator and Image Processor
Device Groups	Create groups to change your application’s cache and delivery behavior according to end-user devices.
Cache Settings	Configure your application’s browser and edge cache expiration time, large file optimization, and advanced cache behavior based on cookies or query strings.
Functions	Instantiate functions created with Functions.
Rules Engine	Automate the execution of behaviors based on specific parameters for your application.

Real-Time Purge

Use Real-Time Purge to clear cached content from Azion’s edge or from the [tiered cache layer]](/en/documentation/products/build/applications/tiered-cache/) to maintain content accuracy, reduce outdated content delivery, and deliver an optimal user experience on your application.

Learn more about Real-Time Purge

Limits

These are the default limits:

Scope	Limit
Minimum CDN cache TTL	60 seconds For the Application Accelerator module: 0 seconds
Debug Rules log size	1.5 kB
Edge-client keepalive connection¹	10 to 15 minutes
Single object size in cache	10 GB

¹ Azion enforces a keepalive connection duration limit between users and applications. To avoid the termination of active connections that require more time to complete, consider implementing file slicing or file compression for large files to improve data transfer speeds.

These are the default limits for each Service Plan:

Scope	Developer	Business	Enterprise	Mission Critical
Edge applications per account	10	50	200	Customizable