Alcatel Lucent

Gopal Surya

Luc Absillis

Sudheer Dharanikota

Operations, administration and management (OAM) functions in a passive optical network (PON) can be performed by providing a system of flow points (i.e., software entities), such as those along the lines of the Maintenance End Points (MEPs) and Maintenance Intermediate Points (MIPs) described in the IEEE 802.1ag specification, which communicate connectivity fault test messages with each other. The flow points can be provided in the Optical Line Terminal (OLT) and Optical Network Terminator (ONT). Alternatively or in addition, flow points can be provided in a subscriber gateway coupled to the ONT. The flow points issue test messages, to which other flow points can respond with information regarding the state of network connectivity.

GPON OAM using IEEE 802.1ag methodology

A Passive Optical Network (PON) includes an Optical Network Terminal (ONT) and an Optical Line Terminal (OLT). The ONT is configured for providing controlled port operations of authenticator Port Access Entity (PAE) functionality and the OLT is configured for providing entity authentication operations of the authenticator PAE functionality. The controlled port operations of authenticator PAE functionality includes inhibiting transmission of non-authentication messages from the ONT, transmitting a supplicant authentication request to the OLT and enabling transmission of non-authentication messages from the ONT in response to receiving supplicant authentication confirmation. The entity authentication operations of the authenticator PAE functionality include facilitating authentication of an identity of the supplicant and facilitating transmission of supplicant authentication confirmation for reception by the ONT in response to the identity being authenticated.

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Gopal Surya