SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR POLICY BASED INTEGRATION TO HORIZONTALLY DEPLOYED WAN OPTIMIZATION APPLIANCES

The present disclosure presents systems and methods for policy based redirection of network traffic, by an intermediary device, to a horizontally deployed WAN device. An intermediary receives a request from a client to access a server. The request was previously modified by a first WAN device to include information in a first option field of a transport layer. The intermediary may determine, responsive to a redirection policy, to send the request to a second WAN optimization device deployed horizontally from the intermediary, instead of the server. The intermediary transmits the request to the second WAN optimization device, while maintaining the information from the first option field. The intermediary device receives the request including the information in the first option field identifying the first WAN optimization device to the second WAN optimization device. The intermediary receives a modified request from the second WAN device, the modified request determined by the intermediary to be sent to the destination server.