Patent ID: 9191496
Filing Date: 2015-11-17
Classification: H04M

Abstract:
1. A digital subscriber line fault locating system comprising: a transmitter unit configured to transmit a handshake request signal into a repeater system, the repeater system comprising a plurality of repeaters and a plurality of loops interconnecting the plurality of repeaters; a receiver unit configured to receive a handshake response signal from the repeater system in response to the handshake request signal, the handshake response signal containing information indicative of an interconnectivity status of at least a portion of the repeater system; a fault analyzer configured to interpret the interconnectivity status and provide an identification of a faulty loop when at least one faulty loop is present in the plurality of loops, wherein to provide the identification of the faulty loop, the fault analyzer is configured to generate a topological representation of at least a portion of the repeater system; and at least one of a head-end test system or a customer premises equipment test system configured to initiate a fault test procedure to identify a location of a fault in the faulty loop, the fault test procedure executed by a remote test system located in a repeater coupled to the faulty loop, wherein each of the handshake request signal and the handshake response signal is in conformance to one or more industry-wide standards directed to handshaking between digital subscriber line transceivers, wherein the one or more industry-wide standards conforms to one or more of the ITU-T G.99x Recommendations, wherein the handshake request signal comprises a first combination of bits configured to operate as a fault status query message contained in a non-standard information field defined in the one or more of the ITU-T G.99x Recommendations, and wherein the handshake response signal comprises a second combination of bits configured to operate as a fault status response message contained in the non-standard information field defined in the one or more of the ITU-T G.99x Recommendations.