Device and method for balancing loads between different paths in a computer system

In a computer system for receiving information from a network, said computer system operable to process said information through at least two paths with at least two layers on one of the paths, a load balancing method for balancing processing of the information on each of the paths of the computer system, said load balancing method comprising the steps of:

• assessing the health of at least two layers on each path;
• generating layer health signals indicative of the health of each assessed layer;
• determining the health of each path based on the layer health signals;
• generating path health signals indicative of the health of each path;
• and
• routing the information to the paths based on the health of the paths.

In a computer system for receiving information from a network, said computer system operable to process said information through at least two paths with at least two layers in one of the paths, a load balancing system for balancing processing of the information on each of the paths of the computer system, said load balancing system comprising:

• a load balancing device for routing said information to each of the at least two paths;
• health assessing agents for assessing the health of at least two layers on each path and generating layer health signals indicative of the health of each assessed layer, the health of the at least two layers being indicative of the status of the hardware and software being executed by each of the at least two layers based on an agent framework library which produces a numerical value corresponding to conditions of the at least two layers including response time to a request, receipt of an error, the number of connections, the number of threads and the number of database connections;
• application information manager for receiving the layer health signals, determining the health of each path based on the health signals, and generating path health signals indicative of the health of each path;
• and
• wherein the load balancing device receives the health path signals and routes the information to the path based on the health of the paths.