Question

What are the differences between a CDN cache node and a mirror?

Answer

Alibaba Cloud Content Delivery Network (CDN) accelerates the delivery of files hosted on accelerated domain names. When users request resources from an accelerated domain name, the CDN nodes nearest to the users retrieve the requested resources from the origin servers, cache the resources while returning them to the users. This back-to-origin process is triggered by users. The second a user requests the resources, the CDN node directly returns the cached resources to the user instead of retrieving the resources from the origin servers.

A mirror is a replica of a website. You can create multiple mirrors of a website. When users request resources, mirrors can directly return the requested resources to the users instead of retrieving the resources from the origin servers.