Patent ID: 7391972

Claim:
A method of controlling a behavior of an element in a passive optical network (PON) comprising: issuing a message from a first PON element to a second PON element to cause the second PON element to enter or maintain a state of upstream communications (a) expected by the first PON element and (b) independent of (i) a state of upstream communications maintained by the second PON element at a time the second PON element receives the message and (ii) an ability of the second PON element to respond to ranging grants, the message being issued dependent on the state of upstream communications of the second PON element as expected by the first PON element and the state of upstream communications being an enabled state or a disabled state; ranging the second PON element by the first PON element if the state of upstream communications of the second PON element is in the enabled state; and bypassing the ranging of the second PON element if the state of upstream communications of the second PON element is in the disabled state.