Supervisory control plane over wavelength routed networks

• US 7,190,896 B1
• Filed: 05/04/2000
• Issued: 03/13/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 05/04/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: RPX Clearinghouse LLC (RPX Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Nortel Networks Limited (Nortel Networks Corporation)
• Inventors: Fan, Yanhe, Wang, Guo Qiang Q.
• Primary Examiner(s): Li, Shi K.
• Application Number:
  US09/563,864
• Time in Patent Office: 2,504 Days
• Field of Search: 359/124, 359/110, 370/351, 370/400, 398/54, 398/57, 398/5, 398/30
• US Class Current: 398/30
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 11/0066 Provisions for optical burst or packet networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 11/0071 Provisions for the electrical-optical layer interface
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2011/0079 Operation or maintenance aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 2011/0088 Signalling aspects

Abstract

A dedicated IP-based wavelength routing/signaling control plane for optically switched network, is provided. The IP-based control plane is an out-band routing/signaling mechanism and does not require optical-electrical-optical (OEO) conversion. The control plane can accommodate the various network topologies of the data plane and if one of the supervisory, or control channel fails, the IP-based control plane can re-route the traffic to destination. Using non-broadcasting addressable protocols the control plane selects a different path to re-direct the control information without declaring the whole communications trail down and without affecting the client traffic over the data path.

Claims

1. A method for out-band routing of control messages to control all-optical networks, comprising the steps of:

establishing communications paths for customer traffic in an all-optical data plane network, said communications paths being associated with control channels for transmitting control messages over an IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network, said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network being separate from said all-optical data plane network such that a topology of said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network is different from a topology of said data plane network, said control plane network including wavelength routing and signaling functions;

mapping said control channels from said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network to said all-optical data plane network, including creating a logical association between said topology of said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network and said topology of said data plane network; and

re-routing said control messages to a destination through an alternative control channel in said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network using non-broadcasting addressable protocols.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said mapping step includes setting up said topology of said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network with IP-based Layer-3 routing and signaling protocols, together with Layer-2 framing protocols in said IP-based, dedicated out-band network, and establishing said logical association between said topology of said IP-based, dedicated out-band control plane network and said topology of said all-optical data plane network.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said non-broadcasting addressable protocols comprising a wavelength routing protocol (WRP) for monitoring the status of wavelengths available on each link of said communications paths, and a wavelength distribution protocol (WDP) performing connections management according to combinations of destination addresses and service type information.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said wavelength routing protocol (WRP) is activated each time a change occurs in the all-optical network topology and in the bandwidth/wavelength availability.