Patent ID: 7515828

Claim:
An optical network operable to carry optical traffic in a plurality of multiplexed wavelengths between a plurality of nodes, the optical network comprising: at least one light-trail established in the optical network between a convener node and an end node, wherein the light-trail couples the convener node, one or more intervening nodes, and the end node, and wherein the light-trail is associated with one of the plurality of wavelengths; an out-of-band control channel associated with a different wavelength than the wavelength associated with the at least one light-trail, the control channel being used to communicate one or more control messages to establish the light-trail and to allocate use of the light-trail by the convener node and the intervening nodes, the convener nodes and the intervening nodes time-sharing the light-trail by each node only transmitting at times allocated to such node using the control channel; and wherein each of the convener node, the one or more intervening nodes, and the end node comprises one or more optical components operable to: receive optical traffic in a plurality of multiplexed wavelengths from the optical network, to drop a first copy of the multiplexed optical traffic from the optical network, and to forward a second copy of the multiplexed optical traffic on the optical network; receive the dropped first copy of the multiplexed optical traffic and forward the optical traffic in selected wavelengths of the plurality of wavelengths for communication to one or more client devices associated with the node; convert traffic received from one or more client devices of the node into client optical traffic in one or more wavelengths; and passively add the client optical traffic to the second copy or to a modification of the second copy to form a combined signal and forward the combined signal to the network.