Note: Each MRA cluster can support a pool of 10 MPE clusters.
The MPE can have dual roles within the MRA. It can be associated with a MRA as an element in the MPE pool of the MRA so that it participates in the load balancing operation of the MRA and it can serve as a Diameter peer for Diameter routing.
The
MPE can function in the following roles:
- The MPE is associated with an MRA and participates in the load balancing action of the MRA.
- The MPE is added as a simple Diameter peer for Diameter routing and it does not participate in the load balancing of the MRA.
- The MPE can serve both roles but not simultaneously.
If there are explicit Diameter routes, the routes take precedence over the load balancing action of the
MRA. To allow maximum flexibility, you can associate an
MPE with an
MRA to cover roles 1 and 3. When you associate an
MPE with the
MRA, the
MPE automatically becomes a Diameter routing peer available in the Diameter routing table. In addition, you can add a new
MPE as a simple Diameter peer to cover role 2. In this case, the
MPE only serves as a simple Diameter peer and does not participate in the load balancing operation at all.
Note: An SCEF server cannot be present in both the SCEF pool and the Diameter routing table at the same time. If you try to do this, an error message is returned indicating that an SCEF entry already exists in either the SCEF pool or the Diameter peer routing table. If an SCEF server is in the peer table and you want to add it to the SCEF pool, you need to delete it from the peer table first and then add it to the SCEF pool. Also, if you try to add an SCEF server to the SCEF pool and the server is also in the Diameter peer routing table, a warning message is displayed informing you that the selected SCEF server cannot be added until it is first deleted from the Diameter peer routing table.