Control and Management of Optical Networks Using Optical Network Description Language

Abstract

Management and configuration of optical networks, implementing new policies to keep up with ever-changing network etc. have always been tedious tasks. Software-defined networking (SDN) has provided many network solutions in the electrical counterpart. SDN for optical networks can provide new opportunities to make the above mentioned tasks easier and faster. As a first step towards this goal, we develop an optical network description language (ONDL). We use it to describe various network components, and their configuration and run-time states, such as modulation schemes, wavelength and spectral-width of a transponder, switching matrix of an optical switch etc. The language is based on resource description framework (RDF). Furthermore, we develop a controller which understands and sends instructions in this language to different network devices to provide/change their states. We show the applicability of ONDL by simulating a network, controlling and managing its nodes using ONDL and developed controller.