TRANSPARENT OVERHEAD IN A PASSIVE OPTICAL NETWORK THAT SUPPORTS ENHANCED FEATURES

摘要

A Gigabit- capable Passive Optical Network (GPON), including an enhanced Optical Line Termination (OLT) and Optical Network Units (ONUs), provides enhanced features, e.g., features defined in XG-PON. One or more of the ONUs are enhanced ONUs. The enhanced OLT communicates with the ONUs via downstream frames and upstream bursts, each downstream frame and upstream burst being compliant with a GPON framing format. The enhanced OLT transmits downstream frames to the ONUs, the downstream frames including downstream sub-frames with at least one downstream sub-frame being an overhead sub-frame that includes information of the enhanced features. The enhanced OLT receives upstream bursts from the ONUs, the upstream bursts including upstream sub-frames, each upstream sub-frame including an upstream identifier field that indicates to the enhanced OLT whether the upstream sub-frame is an overhead sub-frame. The enhanced OLT and the enhanced ONUs perform network operations to provide the enhanced features specified in the overhead sub-frame.