Optical line terminal (OLT) and method therefore for performing in-band and out-band OTDR measurements

An optical line terminal (OLT) for performing in-band optical time-domain reflectometer (OTDR) measurements, comprising:

• an electrical module configured to generate downstream signals and to process received upstream signals according to a communication protocol of a passive optical network (PON);
• an optical module configured to transmit optical signals over a first wavelength, to receive optical upstream signals over a second wavelength, and to transmit optical upstream signals over the second wavelength,
• wherein the optical module further comprises an optical network unit (ONU) traffic processing module, wherein the ONU traffic processing module is configured to perform as an ONU of the PON, to generate a first analysis pattern to be transmitted as the optical upstream signals over the second wavelength, and to analyze a second analysis pattern received in the optical upstream burst signals to perform OTDR measurements, and wherein the first and the second wavelengths are wavelengths defined in the communication standard of the PON;
• and
• an interface configured to interface between the electrical module and the optical module.

An optical line terminal (OLT) for performing out-of-band OTDR measurements, comprising:

• an electrical module configured to generate continuous downstream signals and to process received upstream burst signals according to a communication protocol of a passive optical network (PON);
• an optical module configured to transmit continuous optical signals over a first wavelength, to receive optical upstream burst signals over a second wavelength, to transmit first analysis optical upstream signals over a third wavelength, and to receive second analysis optical upstream burst signals over the third wavelength,
• wherein the optical module further includes an optical network unit (ONU) traffic processing module configured to emulate one of a plurality of optical network units (ONUs) of the PON, to generate a first analysis pattern to be transmitted as the first analysis optical upstream burst signals over the third wavelength, and to analyze a second analysis pattern received in the second analysis optical upstream burst signals to perform the OTDR measurements, wherein the third wavelength is a dedicated wavelength not defined by the communication protocol of the PON;
• and
• an interface configured to interface between the electrical module and the optical module.