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The Optical Internetworking Forum is taking a giant step forward in its efforts to build global interoperability of multi-domain Sonet/SDH transport networks by demonstrating the ability to set-up and tear down Ethernet services across a global optical transport network.

As with last year's interoperability demo, this year's event is hosted by seven carrier members of OIF, whose test labs on three different continents are being linked on a live basis throughout the demo, and features equipment from 12 different vendors. This year's demonstration is substantially more difficult, said Jim Jones of Alcatel, OIF Technical Committee Working Group chair.

"Last year, there were two complementary aspects critical to carrier interoperability that we were able to demonstrate--Ethernet over Sonet, or dataplan mapping of Ethernet into the Sonet infrastructure, and a distributed optical control plane that provides automated provisioning and rapid teardown," he said. "These were done as separate standalone pieces, but this year we are providing integration between those pieces. The distributed optical control plane will trigger a connection that uses Ethernet over Sonet to establish the service."

The demo will include other Ethernet services such as virtual LAN and Internet access or virtual trunking.

Given the global rush to Ethernet services, the demo has a very practical aspect. It will involve the test labs of AT&T and Verizon in the U.S., Deutsche Telekom, France Telecom and Telecom Italia in Europe, and China Telecom and NTT Laboratories in Asia. The participating vendors are Alcatel, Avici Systems, Ciena, Cisco Systems, Fujitsu, Huawei Technologies, Lambda OpticalSystems, Lucent Technologies, Mahi Networks, Marconi, Nortel, Sycamore Networks and Tellabs.

"We are putting [service providers] in a position to offer new data services over legacy networks, which is most important part of our work," said Hans-Martin Foisel of Deutsche Telekom, OIF Carrier Working Group chair. "This shows that this is not just a specification but is a second step toward real deployment."

Adding Ethernet services to their global Sonet/SDH infrastructure helps service providers prolong the lives of those networks and their investment in them, said Rama Ati of Cisco Systems, OIF Market Awareness & Education Committee co-chair.