Once a packet arrives as a particular CloudFlare data center we want to ensure it gets to a server that can correctly handle the request. There are four key tasks that CloudFlare's servers perform: DNS, proxy, cache, and logging. We tend to follow the Google-like approach and deploy generic, white-box servers that can perform a number of different functions. (Incidentally, if anyone is interested, we're thinking of doing a blog post to "tour" a typical CloudFlare server and discuss the choices we made in working with manufacturers to design them.) Since servers can fail or be overloaded, we need to be able to route traffic intelligently around problems. For that, we return to our old friend Anycast.