Abstract

For many years, we have been debating the merits of opaque network architectures versus those of all-optical architectures. Today, we are at a point where opaque architectures are widely deployed and new products enabling all-optical architectures are emerging. Opaque architectures use point-to-point WDM line systems along with electrical cross connects to switch traffic at the nodes. The all-optical network vision, on the other hand, is to retain signals in the optical domain all the way from their source to their destination using photonic cross connects to switch the traffic at the intermediate nodes.

© 2002 Optical Society of America