Patent ID: 9698901
Date: 2017-07-04
CPC Classifications: H04B,H04J

Claim:
1. A method of protecting traffic in a communications network, the communications network providing paths for the traffic extending from a source client entity to a destination client entity via an optical transport network, providing at least one attachment circuit for coupling the source client entity to corresponding ingress nodes of the optical transport network, and providing at least one attachment circuit at the egress, for coupling corresponding egress nodes of the optical transport network to the destination client entity, the attachment circuits comprising dual homed attachment circuits at least at the ingress nodes, and the paths comprising paths within the optical transport network, to couple respective pairs of the ingress and egress nodes, the method having steps of: sending through the optical transport network an indication of operational status of at least one of the dual homed attachment circuits, the indication being sent within overhead associated with the traffic and sent with the traffic, and at a node of the optical transport network, selecting which of the provided paths and attachment circuits to use for the traffic, based on the indication of operational status of the attachment circuits sent through the optical transport network, to protect the traffic against a fault in the attachment circuit and against a fault in the optical transport network, wherein the traffic comprises at least two traffic flows each having a respective source client entity and destination client entity, the at least two traffic flows having their own dual homed attachment circuits and sharing the same paths through at least some of the optical transport network, wherein the indication sent within the overhead comprises indications of operational status of the respective attachment circuits of the at least two traffic flows.