The Content Switching Module provides high-performance connections between network devices and server farms (groups of real servers) based on Layer 4 through 7 packet information. Clients connect to the CSM by supplying the virtual IP address (VIP) of the virtual server. The CSM is configured to handle VIP address connections. When a client initiates a connection to the virtual server, the CSM chooses a real server (a physical device that is assigned to a server farm) for the connection based on configured load-balancing algorithms and policies.Representing server farms as virtual servers facilitates scalability and availability. The addition of new servers and the removal or failure of existing servers can occur at any time without affecting the virtual server's availability. Sticky connections limit traffic to individual servers. These connections are configured so that multiple connections from the same client are stuck to the same real server using source IP addresses, source IP subnets, cookies, secure socket layer (SSL), or redirected using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) requests. Policies manage traffic by defining where to send client requests for information.