NETWORK TEST INSTRUMENT WITH TESTING SESSION ANALYSIS

• US 20170063478A1
• Filed: 08/31/2015
• Published: 03/02/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 08/31/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Viavi Solutions, Inc. (Lumentum Holdings Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Viavi Solutions, Inc. (Lumentum Holdings Inc.)
• Inventors: FLASK, Robert J.
• Granted Patent: US 10,615,894 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/0085 using test signal generators
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/23 Indication means, e.g. displays, alarms, audible means
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/309 Measuring or estimating channel quality parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/318 Received signal strength
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/08 Testing, supervising or monitoring using real traffic

Abstract

A test instrument can be coupled to a test point in a network and measure signals in the network that are received via a port connected to the test point. The test instrument may connect to the network via multiple test points. The measurements of the signals received through one or more of the test points are correlated to detect a problem in the network and determine a suggested action.

Claims

1. A network signal testing device comprising:

at least one port connectable to at least one test point in a network;

a measurement circuit to measure a plurality of characteristics of at least one signal received on the at least one port via the at least one test point;

a processing circuit to determine a problem and a suggested action for the problem based on correlating the plurality of measured characteristics; and

a user interface including a display, wherein the processing circuit displays the problem and the suggested action on the display.

2. The network signal testing device of claim 1, wherein the at least one test point comprises a plurality of test points, and the measurement circuit is to measure the plurality of characteristics of at least one signal received at each test point, and the plurality of characteristics for the signals received at the plurality of test points are correlated to determine the problem and the suggested action.

3. The network signal testing device of claim 2, wherein the at least one signal comprises an upstream signal and a downstream signal received through at least one of the plurality of test points.

4. The network signal testing device of claim 1, wherein the plurality of characteristics comprise a plurality of power level, adjacent channel power level, system levels, Bit Error Ratio (BER) and Modulation Error Ratio (MER), Digital Quality Index (DQI), ingress under carrier, echoes, in channel response, group delay, digital hum, Automatic Gain Control (AGC) stress, coherent interference, and channel noise.

5. The network signal testing device of claim 1, wherein measurement circuit measures the plurality of characteristics in a predetermined signal characteristic order for at least one channel.

6. The network signal testing device of claim 5, wherein the at least one channel comprises a plurality of channels, and the measurement circuit measures the plurality of characteristics for the plurality of channels in a predetermined channel order.

7. The network signal testing device of claim 6, wherein the processing circuit displays on the display visual feedback of progress of problem detection as the measurement circuit measures the plurality of characteristics for the plurality of channels.

8. The network signal testing device of claim 7, wherein the visual feedback comprises displaying problems associated with the plurality of characteristics as the plurality of characteristics are measured, and the processing circuit is to receive user input via the user interface to stop the measurements of the plurality of characteristics for the plurality of channels and display results prior to completion of the measurements for the plurality of channels.

9. The network signal testing device of claim 1, wherein the suggested action comprises guided operations to perform to correct the problem.

10. The network signal testing device of claim 1, wherein the processing circuit invokes the measurement of the plurality of characteristics of the signal in response to receiving an input via the user interface to test the signal.

11. The network signal testing device of claim 1, comprising:

a communications interface, wherein the processing circuit is to send the plurality of measured characteristics to a remote computer via the communications interface.

12. A method of testing a signal transmitted in a network, the method comprising:

measuring a plurality of characteristics of a signal received on at least one port of a test instrument connected to the network through at least one test point;

correlating the plurality of measured characteristics to detect a problem in the network and determine a suggested action for the problem; and

presenting, via a display of the test instrument, the detected problem and the suggested action.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the characteristics are measured for signals received at a plurality of test points, and the measuring comprises:

receiving a session ID for a session;

receiving test point information for each test point;

receiving user input to start testing for each test point; and

measuring the plurality of characteristics of a signal received through each test point in response to receiving the user input to start testing.

14. The method of claim 12, comprising:

storing a table of a plurality of subsets of the plurality of measured characteristics and a corresponding problem and suggested action for each subset;

wherein correlating the plurality of measured characteristics to detect a problem in the network and determine a suggested action for the problem comprises;

detecting a plurality of the measured characteristics that are out of tolerance;

identifying the problem from the table that is based on the out of tolerance characteristics; and

identifying the suggested action from the table that corresponds to the problem.

15. A test instrument connectable to a network, the test instrument comprising:

at least one port connectable to test points in the network;

a measurement circuit to measure characteristics of signals from the network that are received on the at least one port via the test points;

a user interface to receive user input and display information associated with the measured characteristics; and

a processing circuit to

receive user input to start testing at each of the test points;

facilitate the measurement circuit to measure the characteristics of the signals at each test point in response to the user input;

determine a problem and a suggested action for the problem based on the measured characteristics; and

display, on the user interface, the problem and the suggested action.

16. The test instrument of claim 15, comprising:

a data storage to store information comprising a plurality of subsets of the plurality of measured characteristics and a corresponding problem and suggested action for each subset;

wherein to determine a problem and a suggested action, the processing circuit is to;

detecting a plurality of the measured characteristics that are out of tolerance;

identify the problem from the stored information based on the out of tolerance characteristics; and

identify the suggested action from the stored information that corresponds to the problem.

17. The test instrument of claim 15, comprising:

a communications interface to connect the test instrument to a remote computer, wherein to determine the problem and the suggested action, the processing circuit is to;

detect a plurality of the measured characteristics that are out of tolerance;

send a request to the remote computer via the communications interface to determine the problem and suggested action, wherein the request identifies the plurality of the measured characteristics that are out of tolerance, and the remote computer performs a lookup on a stored table based on the plurality of the measured characteristics that are out of tolerance to identify the problem and suggested action;

receive the results of the lookup via the communications interface from the remote computer; and

determine the problem and the suggested action from the results.

18. The test instrument of claim 15, wherein the signals measured at each of the test points comprise upstream and downstream signals.

19. The test instrument of claim 18, comprising:

a pulse generator to output a reflectometry pulse to the at least one port, and the upstream signals include a reflectometry pulse reflected from an impedance back towards the at least one port.

20. The test instrument of claim 19, wherein the reflectometry pulse comprises a time domain reflectometry pulse or a frequency domain reflectometry pulse.