Patent ID: 7801034

Claim:
A method for allocating the use of an optical light-trail, the light-trail enabling a plurality of nodes included in the light-trail to share the use of an optical wavelength to transmit traffic between the nodes included in the light-trail, the method comprising: calculating a bid at a first node in the light-trail with consideration for the criticality of the node's need to transmit particular traffic on the light-trail; transmitting the calculated bid to one or more of the other nodes included in the light-trail; receiving an acknowledgment from one or more of the other nodes included in the light-trail, each acknowledgement indicating whether the transmitted bid is higher or lower than a bid calculated by the node from which the acknowledgment originates; and determining, based at least on the content of acknowledgements received, whether the transmitted bid is the highest bid; wherein receiving an acknowledgment from one or more of the other nodes comprises receiving a negative acknowledgment from any nodes having a calculated bid higher than the transmitted bid and receiving a positive acknowledgment from any nodes having a calculated bid lower than the transmitted bid.