How does the Windows Azure CDN handle byte-range requests?
The Windows Azure CDN accepts and properly responds to HTTP requests which specify byte ranges in the headers. However, several caveats may affect your end-user experience and your bill. Our caching service does NOT cache byte ranges individually. Instead, when a request for a byte range of an object is received, the edge server checks to see if the entire file is in cache. If the entire file is present, the byte-range request is served from the local cache. Otherwise, the edge server does two things: •It fetches the indicated range directly from origin and returns it to the requester; the byte range is not cached. Essentially, the CDN proxies the byte-range request directly back to the Windows Azure Storage origin. Windows Azure Storage responds properly to byte-range requests, and these origin requests will be charged accordingly for Azure Storage data transfer. •If the requested byte range is in the first 100kb of the object, the edge server fetches the entire object to local cache.
