The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 27, 2011
Filed:
Dec. 21, 2005
John Osswald, Northbridge, MA (US);
Michael Poon, Westford, MA (US);
John Osswald, Northbridge, MA (US);
Michael Poon, Westford, MA (US);
Nortel Networks Limited, Mississauga, Ontario, CA;
Abstract
A system for originating connectivity fault management (CFM) frames on non-CFM aware switches is disclosed. In the disclosed system, an OAM (Operations Administration and Management) proxy networking device connected to a core Ethernet network operates with one or more CPE (Customer Premises Equipment) devices to which it is communicably connected to support CFM out to the CPE devices without requiring that the CPE devices themselves implement CFM functionality. The OAM proxy networking device generates Connectivity Check (CC) frames, Loopback reply frames, and Linktrace reply frames for MEPs (Maintenance End Points) or MIPs (Maintenance Intermediate Points) contained in communication ports on the CPEs. These CFM frames generated by the OAM proxy networking device are then sent within messages from the OAM proxy networking device to the appropriate CPE. When the CPE device receives a message from the OAM proxy networking device containing one of these CFM frames, it checks the operability of a communication port indicated by the message. If the port is operable, the CPE device extracts the CFM frame from the message and originates it through the OAM proxy networking device into the core Ethernet network. The OAM proxy networking device further operates to process Connectivity Check frames received from the core Ethernet network and addressed to the CPE devices by maintaining an MEP connectivity database. As a result, these received Connectivity Check frames are dropped without forwarding to the CPE devices.