Apparatus and method for forward error correction over a communication channel

A method comprising:

• receiving an OTN (Optical Transport Network) frame;
• removing FEC (Forward Error Correction) parity from the OTN frame;
• re-structuring data from the OTN frame;
• creating new FEC parity locations;
• and
• generating FEC parity for the new FEC parity locations before the OTN frame is transmitted by an OTL (Optical channel Transport Lane) over a communication channel;
• wherein generating the FEC parity is executed in a manner that compensates for bit shuffling performed by the OTL.

An apparatus comprising:

• means for removing FEC (Forward Error Correction) parity from an OTN (Optical Transport Network) frame;
• means for creating new FEC parity locations;
• means for bit shuffling data from the OTN frame;
• means for generating FEC parity for the new parity locations, wherein the FEC parity is generated based on the data that has been bit shuffled;
• means for bit de-shuffling the data from the OTN frame prior to the OTN frame being transmitted by an OTL (Optical channel Transport Lane) over a communication channel;
• wherein the means for bit shuffling and the means for bit de-shuffling compensate for any bit shuffling performed by the OTL such that data striping is achieved at a symbol level across physical lanes of the communication channel despite inverse multiplexing of the OTN frame by the OTL.