Optical swapping of digitally-encoded optical labels
AssigneeAT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
InventorsMark David Feuer, Vincent Anant Vaishampayan
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method and a device are provided for swapping optical labels in an optical communication network. Optical information, including payload data and label data digitally encoded into the optical information, is received. At least one group of bits within the optical information is selectively inverted to rewrite the label data with new label data without changing the payload data. Each of the at least one group of inverted bits includes at least two bits and all bits of each of the at least one group of inverted bits are contiguous bits.
Claims19
A method for swapping optical labels in an optical communication network, the method comprising:
- tapping a fraction of a composite optical signal to yield a tapped fraction, wherein the composite optical signal has label data and payload data and wherein the label data has a first label;
- passing the tapped fraction to a label swapping device which replaces the first label with a second label;
- selectively inverting via a processor at least one bit in the composite optical signal based on the difference between the first label and the second label;
- and
- forming the composite optical signal by:
- encoding groups of K raw payload bits into blocks of N bits by using a complementary code having two blocks of differing weight to represent each possible group of K raw payload bits, wherein the two blocks are complements of each other;
- and
- incorporating one of the two blocks into the label data.
A computing device for recovering optical labels from a received optical signal, wherein the received optical signal includes at least one optical label altered according to steps comprising:
- producing, via a processor, a difference signal representing a difference of bit settings between first optical header data and second optical header data in the received optical signal;
- and
- selectively inverting at least two contiguous bits in the received optical signal, such that the first optical header data is equal to the second optical header data, wherein the received optical signal was formed by:
- encoding groups of K raw payload bits into blocks of N bits by using a complementary code having two blocks of differing weight to represent each possible group of K raw payload bits, wherein the two blocks are complements of each other;
- and
- incorporating one of the two blocks into the at least one optical label.
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions which, when executed by a computing device, cause the computing device to swap network header data, the instructions comprising:
- producing a difference signal representing a difference of bit settings between first header data and second header data in a composite optical signal;
- receiving a signal and the difference signal;
- selectively inverting at least two contiguous bits in the signal such that the first header data is equal to the second header data;
- and
- forming the composite optical signal by:
- encoding groups of K raw payload bits into blocks of N bits by using a complementary code having two blocks of differing weight to represent each possible group of K raw payload bits, wherein the two blocks are complements of each other;
- and
- incorporating one of the two blocks into the label data.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.