Patent ID: 6137775
Filing Date: 2000-10-24
Classification: H04Q

Abstract:
A method of planning spare capacity for a communication network, the network including a plurality of logical spans and a plurality of physical spans, the network further having a plurality of links, each link being either a working link or a spare link, wherein each working link carries at least one live circuit and each spare link is capable of substituting for any working link during one or more failure events, the failure events including both actual failures and simulated failures, the method comprising the steps of:(1) determining a maximum number of working links that could fail due to failure of any physical span;(2) initializing for each physical span a maximum number of spare links equal to said maximum number of working links as determined in step (1);(3) selecting a first physical span, said first physical span being known as a reduction span, all other physical spans being known as non-reduction spans;(4) removing a first spare link from said reduction span;(5) selecting one of said non-reduction spans as a designated non-reduction span;(6) temporarily disabling the working links and the spare links associated with said designated non-reduction span;(7) monitoring the communication network to determine a network response; and(8) determining, based on said network response, whether failed spans in the communication network were restored.