Patent ID: 8665709

Claim:
A system for sharing a protection path between at least two protection groups of network paths in a network, said system comprising: at least one working path associated with each of said protection groups, M working maintenance entity groups (“WMEGs”) comprising a first plurality of endpoint systems, the first plurality of endpoint systems monitoring the status of each of said at least one working path, each WMEG, using at least the first plurality of end point systems, notifying the protection group associated with the working path monitored by the first plurality of endpoint systems of changes in the status of said working path monitored by the first plurality of endpoint systems, N protection maintenance entity groups (“PMEGs”) comprising a second plurality of endpoint systems, the second plurality of endpoint systems monitoring the status of said protection path, each PMEG, using at least the second plurality of end point systems, notifying each of said at least two protection groups of changes in the status of said protection path, and each of said protection groups sharing said protection path and being switchable to said protection path in response to the receipt of a first notification from said WMEG of a change to a non-operational status for the respective working paths associated with said protection groups; wherein M and N are integers equal to or greater than 2, wherein N is less than or equal to M, and wherein each of said at least one working path is in a same maintenance entity group comprising said WMEG such that a single 1:1 state machine is operated between said WMEG and said PMEG with load sharing between each of said at least one working path and said protection path, and wherein each of said protection groups are automatically switchable to the respective working paths in response to the receipt of a second notification from said WMEG of change to an operational status for the respective working paths associated with said protection groups; wherein said system includes a scheduling algorithm that prioritizes data traffic from one of the said protection groups in order to cause the prioritized data traffic to access bandwidth with preference over the rest of the data traffic; and wherein a WMEG of said M WMEGs, using at least the first plurality of end point systems, manages Operation Administration and Maintenance (“OAM”) packets from said working paths and conveys status information about said working paths to their associated protection groups using the OAM packets and wherein a PMEG of said N PMEGs, using at least the second plurality of end point systems, manages OAM packets from said protection path and conveys status information about said protection path to one or more protection groups using the OAM packets.