256 Proc. 27th Eur. Conf. on Opt. Comm. (ECOC'OI - Amsterdam) We.B. 1 .

Design and Experiments of an Automatic Switched

Optical Network (ASON)
Lampros Raptis (l),Giorgos Chatzilias (l),Antonio Manzalini (2), Carlo Cavazzoni (2),
Giuseppe Ricucci (2), G. Lehr (3), U. Hartmer (3), R. Geerdsen (3), M. Jaeger (3),
A.Gladisch (3), D. Colle (4), S. De Maesschalck (4), I. Lievens (4) ,P. Demeester (4),
Luigi Piergiovanni (5)
(1) National Technical University of Athens (Iraptis@telecom.ntua.gr)
( 2 ) Telecom Italia Lab (antonio.manzalini@tilab.com)
(3) T-NOVA Deutsche Telekom Innovationsgesellschaft mbH (georg.lehr@t-systemsde)
(4) Ghent University - IMEC (dcolle@intec.rug.ac.be)
(5) Sirti S.p.A. (l.piergiovanni@Sirti.it)

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to describe the activities and the preliminary results ofthe IST Project LION,
whose main objective is to design and fest a robust und nianuged transport network bused on an ASON

Introduction /customer requests, support of optical virtual private

networks, support of different levels of Quality of Service.
The exponential growth of data traffic has posed new
emerging requirements for traditional transport networks.
4 s a matter of fact existing TDM networks have been Reliable Network Design
designed for voice and leased-line services. These transport Designing a reliable network means at least providing
networks should now evolve to support larger channels: the enough spare resources in the network. Consider a national
deployment of WDM point-to-point systems was just the backbone IP network, consisting of 16 routers
first step to expand the bandwidth. Nevertheless just over- interconnected by 33 links. This IP network is supported by
provisioning bandwidth is not sufficient. Today, recent an Optical Transport Network (I4nodes, 29 links).
progresses in the optical technology allow implementing
network knctionality directly into the optical layer. This cost
transport network is already recommended as Optical
Transport Network (0"). Even more innovative, an
ASON is an OTN capable of automatic switching and
routing of optical connections.
Particularly, referring to ASON there is a growing interest
in investigating how to deploy inter-working functionality
like the establishment of a dynamic optical connection
driven by IP routers via UN1 signalling.
In this context, control plane architectures and signalling- NoProledOn Llnk ReStDieIlcn Palh
Redoram"
Protedtoo

routing protocols, management and survivability o f a multi-
layer network are key areas of investigations of several
international fora and project.
This paper aims to investigate how to dimension data-
centric next generation optical network, and to design the
appropriate control and management plane functionality,
with respect to current and emerging network requirements.
Finally the LION test-bed, being developed to assess 1P -
ASON inter-working, IS briefly descnbed.
Emerging Network Requirements
Various business roles like Application Service Providers,
Network Service Providers, Internet Service Providers and
carriers' carriers, pose different requirements to the
evolution of current transport networks [I]. These
requirements are enabling the networks to support existing
and emerging service chains (e.g. communication services,
business services and Internet services). Network evolution
is moving to a multi-service network able to carry voice,
data and video. New requirements are emerging, like [2]:
fast and automatic end-to-end provisioning, fast and
efficient rerouting, support of different clients but
optimised for IP (efficient transport, traffic engineering,
etc), dynamic set-up of connections based on client
OTN Layer Recovery Scheme
Figure 1: impact of protection against router failures
Figure 1 illustrates the dimensioning results based on a top-
down approach: the IP layer is designed first and
aftcrwards the OTN. It was assumed that the OTN always
recovers from frequently occurring cable cuts. In addition
to this a comparison is made, whether the IP layer should
recover from router failures (by means of MPLS Local
Protection [3]) or not (depending whether router failures
are expected or unexpected failures): this could lead to a
significant cost increase (Figure 1).
Control Plane Issues
The term control plane refers to a set of protocols for
distributed routing control, connection management,
resource discovery, etc, and can be mainly classified into
signalling and routing issues. In principle, both IP and
ASON need a control plane with relatively similar
requirements, therefore a re-use of concepts and protocols
of the IP or IP/MPLS control plane for the ASON is under
consideration. From this perspective three different
scenarios or control plane models [4] can be distinguished:
We.B. 1 . I Proc. 27th Eur. Conf. on Opt. Comm. (ECOC’OI - Amsterdam)
The Overlay Model, where the IPMPLS
network and ASON have separate and independent control
planes The IP network acta as one of the clients of the
Optical domain, which provides point-to-point connections
and these clients request optical channels via the so-called
User-Network Interface (UNI)
The Peer Model, where a single control planc
instance runs over both the IPMPLS and optical domains,
avoiding unnecessary duplication of hnctionality and
simplifying layer inter-working. However, non-IP serviccs
are difficult to be integrated and if an isolation of the
control between the OTN and IP domains is necessary this
seems impossible
4n Augmented Model, wherc there are actually
separate control plane instances in the 1P and optical
doinains, but information from one routing instance IS
pdssed through the other routing instance For example,
cxternal 1P addresses could be carried within the optical
routing protocols to allow reachability information to be
passed to IP clients
Table 1: Comparison of domain service approach
Table I compares the three models The augmented model
tries to combine the best of the peer and the overlay
approach, but it is not clear how much the augmented
model would increase the complexity of routing and
signalling protocols. We are currently investigating if an
augmented model can be realised by interconnecting 1P and
optical doinains via Border Gateway Protocol (BGP).
However, BGP would require modifications for this
purpose. Current issues to be resolvcd are:
I t is not sufficient anymore to lcak addresses ftom one
doinaiii to the other one, since a remote node should
be able to differentiate the type of equipment (e.g.,
IP router or OXC) assigned to a particular address.
Realising an ICP link by routing it through another
A S is very tricky or even impossible. For examplc, a
router will not see other routers in its own
Autonomous System (AS) through the BGP interface
with the optical AS.
LION test bed
The main objective of the LION project is to design and
test a robust and managed transport network based on an
Automatic Switched Optical Network. This infrastructure is
aimed at carrying multiple clients (eg. SDH, ATM, [P-
based) with inter-working and interconnection between
layer transport networks and domains. Network Studies
results are being validated in a tcst bcd where 1P Giga
Switch Routers (GSR) will be integrated over Optical
Network Elements, such as OADM and OXC. Figure 2
shows the architechire of LION test bed. The test-bed is
being developed to assess some innovative functionality of
optical networks inter-working IP clients. Particularly, our
focus is to set-up and tear down Optical Channel
connections by IP routers via UN1 signalling
The technical approach adopted by LION was not reinvent
anything but leveraging existing work performed by IETF,
01F and ITU. In this sense the major effort was to profile
257
existing interface and protocol specifications to assess
some innovative network functionality within the test-bed
The selected UN1 protocol is RSW-TE, compliant with
OIF UN1 1 0 specification For the dynamic routing
information and dissemination of the topology, extension to
the ISIS/OSPF [5],[6] will be considered The test-bed
network inodel is the overlay; nevertheless the Project is
considering also augmented and peer-to-peer models (even
for Generalised-MPLS architectures)
T Nova NMS TlLab NMS
TlLab OTN
Figure 2: IST LION test bed
From the management viewpoint, the test-bed is divided
into two domains. Inter-domain Management is possible
via the Network Level Interface (NL-IF) which is based on
CORBA. The NL-IF connects mutually the network
element level (NEL-OS) and the network level (NL-OS)
operating systems, and for its definition the coarse grained
CORBA approach promoted by ETSI has been chosen. The
NL-OS, which should give an overall view of the entire
network acts mainly as a client of the NEL-OS, which
provides a view of a single sub-network.
SumrnaryKonclusions
This paper described the activities and the preliminary
results of the IST Project LION “Layers Interworking in
Optical Networks”. Particularly the main objective of the
prqject is to design and test a robust and inanaged transport
network based on an Automatic Switched Optical Network.
Acknowledgements
The Authors wish to thank all Participants of the IST
Project LION and the EC for partly funding this work.
References
/I/ Artur Lason et. al, “Convergence of IP-based and
Optical Transport Networks”, Intenvorking’2000,
Bcrgen, Norway, 3 - 6 October 2000
/2/ G.astn v.05.1 ,“Architecture for the Automatic
Switched Transport Network”, Paris 6-9 March 2001
/3/ D. Colle et. al., “MPLS Recovery Mechanisms for IP-
over-WDM networks”, PNet, VoI.3, No. 1, January,
2001, to be published
/4/ Bala Rajagopalan et al, “IP over Optical Networks: A
Framcwork” draft-many-ip-optical-framework-01 .txt
151 “IS-IS extensions for Traffic Engineering”, draft-ietf-
isis-traffic-02.txt
/G/ “Traffic Engineering Extensions to OSPF”, draR-
katz-ycung-ospf-traffic-03 .txt