Patent ID: 7433593

Claim:
A method of maintaining a network connection in an optical network, comprising: obtaining channel assignment data comprising which channel of a plurality of channels is assigned to the network connection on each of a plurality of spans used by the network connection, wherein the optical network comprises a plurality of switching nodes and an egress switching node in one of a ring and a mesh topology, the plurality of spans comprising working and protecting fibers operatively connecting the plurality of switching nodes and carrying the plurality of channels; propagating the channel assignment data to the plurality of switching nodes in the optical network through one of an overhead data channel, an out-of-band protocol, a service channel, and an overlay IP network; storing, at each of the plurality of switching nodes, the channel assignment data; monitoring the optical network for a failed span between two switching nodes of the plurality of switching nodes and notifying the optical network in response to the failed span, wherein the two switching nodes perform a line switching operation in response to the notification in order to switch the network connection to the protecting fiber; determining at the egress node which channel the network connection utilized on the failed span based on the channel assignment data and the notification of the failed span, wherein the channel assignment data and the notification of the failed span are utilized to efficiently configure which channel to drop responsive to the failed span, and wherein the channel is determined by the determining step responsive to the stored channel assignment data when the failed span occurs; and dropping the channel selected by said determining step from the protecting fiber at the egress switching node, wherein the determining and dropping steps are performed following the line switching operation.