Patent ID: 8774632

Claim:
A degree in a reconfigurable optical add drop multiplexer node, comprising: transmit optical components configured to receive a plurality of transmit wavelengths and to transmit the plurality of transmit wavelengths external to the node; receive optical components configured to receive a plurality of receive wavelengths external from the node and to transmit the plurality of receive wavelengths to one or more components in the node; and topology optical components configured to transmit and receive a topology wavelength both external to the node and to the one or more components in the node, wherein the topology optical components are connected to the transmit optical components and the receive optical components, wherein in a wavelength division multiplexed system there are N wavelengths available for carrying data, wherein the topology wavelength comprises one of the N wavelengths that is dedicated and unavailable for carrying traffic and is within a gain bandwidth of an optical amplifier, and wherein the topology wavelength is being detected at an unprovisioned port in the reconfigurable optical add drop multiplexer node, and the reconfigurable optical add drop multiplexer node is configured to map connections based on the topology wavelength and further passes the topology wavelength to other nodes.