Ciena introduced its WaveLogic Photonics — a set of programmable, optical transmission capabilities combining adjustable packet and OTN traffic management, including flexible line elements such as programmable line amplifiers, Smart Raman and customizable Reconfigurable Optical Add/Drop Multiplexer (ROADMs) configurations – from metro to core.
Ciena said its goal with WaveLogic Photonics, which represents the next step in its OPn architecture evolution, is to make the network more dynamic and responsive to changing demands and applications needs. The new capabilities build upon the intelligence already found in Ciena’s WaveLogic coherent optics across the entire optical line system.
Product enhancements include:
- Expanded control plane capabilities – Ciena’s OneConnect Intelligent Control Plane now includes additional distributed intelligence across the photonic and OTN layers. This ensures that operators can offer a broad selection of service level guarantees and new service offerings.
- Smart Raman – Eliminating time consuming manual configuration steps as well as the potential damage to equipment and fiber that accompanies traditional Raman deployments, Ciena’s Smart Raman provides simple and automatic turn-up by autonomously testing and ensuring proper fiber conditions are met prior to self-activation. The ability to plug and play Raman into the network helps service providers optimize span and system designs and minimize the use of costly regenerators.
- PinPoint – Ciena’s advanced fiber analytic software leverages Optical Time Domain Reflectometer (OTDR) capabilities that are now integrated directly into the network elements to create a complete fiber loss profile – analogous to a CT scan of the network. This allows network operators to precisely localize and deal with potential trouble spots, reducing the risk of outages and accelerating repair times from days to hours. It creates the opportunity for proactive maintenance to improve network characteristics and also keeps track of historical information so administrators can remotely validate that installation, maintenance and repairs have been properly executed, which ensures the fiber plant is always conditioned for optimal system performance.
“Wavelogic Photonics is another step in realizing our OPn network architecture vision, which is designed to make networks more responsive to business needs. As networks become strategic application-responsive assets, an intelligent, agile optical layer is vital to achieving the necessary flexibility to support changing network demands. WaveLogic Photonics enables network operators to reliably shift their operating model from just ‘configuring’ to actually ‘programming’ the network in real-time– increasing service velocity while eliminating the potential for manual errors and the cumbersome tracking processes that plague networking today. It also allows operators to easily view their network assets and program them to automatically respond to service requests and intelligently route packet services across the network,” stated Steve Alexander, Chief Technology Officer, Ciena.