OPTICAL ETHER

• It is similar to conventional Ethernet LAN with the exception of physical layer.

• It’s the 4th generation of Ethernet family and ATM, it uses IP-based technology.
• Optical Ethernet  accepted as technology for virtual connectivity
• A GIGABIT ETHERNET network was developed in 1998 by merging together
two technologies(IEEE 802.3 Ethernet and ANSI X3T11) fiber channel to
enable it to operate at transmission rate.(100 Mbps to 10 Gbps) using optical
fiber.
• Different types of optical Ethernet connections
• Point to point connection
– only a single network node is connected with another node
• Point to multi point connection
– enables a single node interconnection with two or more network
nodes
– For example, node 1 can transmit to nodes 2 and 3 simultaneously
while it can also receive transmissions from both these nodes.
• Multipoint to multipoint
– the nodes have similar connectivity patterns where each can be
connected to a common fiber channel.
– The increased network node connectivity patterns of the
multipoint-to-multipoint configuration can resemble a bus, tree
or a mesh topology.
– Simultaneous transmission and reception is possible for all the
nodes
– Such a multipoint to multipoint junction can be employed to work
as a switching hub with the non-blocking switching features.
Since it facilitates a switching function between different
Ethernet users, it is commonly referred to as Ethernet switch.
• Optical Ethernet employs standard Ethernet
protocol which incorporates 4 basic aspects:
– The frame
– MAC
– Signaling components
– Physical medium
 1. The frame
– An Ethernet frame is a standardized set of specific fields each comprising
a different number of bits which is used to carry data over the network.

• Preamble : informs receiving nodes that a frame is being transmitted, alerting

them to start receiving the data.
• Unique Destination and Source address fields: allow the optical Ethernet
equipment to avoid the problem of two or more Ethernet interfaces in a
network having the same address.
• Type or Length field : which is used to identify the type or the length of
other network protocols being carried in the data field.
• The Data field : ensures that the frame signals must stay on the network
long enough for every Ethernet node to detect the frame within the correct
time limit.
• Frame check sequence: provides a checking procedure for the integrity of
the data in the entire frame. This field allows the receiving optical Ethernet
interface to verify that the bits in the frame have arrived without an error.
 MAC
• The MAC protocol provides a set of rules embedded in each
Ethernet interface to access the shared channel among the multiple
networking nodes.

SIGNALING COMPONENTS

– Each network node primarily performs two tasks which are either to
transmit or to receive data where the received data may also be
required to be forwarded to other networking nodes.
– Therefore these nodes constitute a group of signaling components and
may comprise standalone devices such as repeaters, switches, couplers
or routers.

PHYSICAL MEDIUM

• the physical medium consists of the cables and other hardware used to carry
the optical Ethernet signals between networking nodes.
• POINT TO POINT ACCESS NETWORK

(A point-to-point optical Ethernet operating as an access network )

• The optical distribution node (ODN) provides point-to-point

access on a bidirectional single-mode optical fiber.
• Two different wavelength regions of 1.26 to 1.36 μm and 1.48 to
1.58 μm are used for upstream and downstream transmission,
respectively.
• The service network interface (SNI) is connected to the
optical line termination (OLT) at the local exchange/office
while the user network interface (UNI) is connected to the
optical network termination (ONT) at the user locations.
• POINT TO MULTIPOINT ACCESS NETWORK

• A point-to-multipoint Ethernet PON (EPON) can also be configured

based on the point to point optical Ethernet.
(EPON: ETHERNET PASSIVE OPTICAL NETWORK)
• The network termination (NT) provides the user network interface
line termination function and the ONT combines the functions of the
ONU and NT.
• The bandwidth in the EPON can be assigned dynamically or statically
and is chosen by the OLT.
– In the static assignment the bandwidth can be divided into
upstream and downstream, whereas in the dynamic assignment
procedure the OLT sets the upstream bandwidth for each ONU (or
ONT) according to the request from ONUs (or ONTs).