Everyone: I am helping some folks with a Squid cache setup and would like to request the addition of a simple feature. What I need is an ACL type called "random" which would be of the form acl aclname random .666666 Where the ACL will be matched with the specified probability. This type of ACL is commonly found in firewalls, and allows for all sorts of interesting applications, including simple load balancing, traffic sampling, fault simulation, etc. For example, when used in conjunction with tcp_outgoing_address, it would allow requests to be distributed among multiple links in proportion to their capacities. (I've seen some people asking for such load balancing on the Squid mailing lists; this would allow it without a requirement to implement a complex new feature. And one could do much more with this ACL as well.) It is already possible to simulate this sort of ACL (in fact, I've tried it), but using an external "helper" program is incredibly inefficient. It would be far faster and more efficient if a simple "random" ACL were coded right in. It seems to me that this would be trivial to do for a developer who is already familiar with the source. Would it be possible for someone to add it? --Brett Glass
