An optical network is described that has a first ROADM node, a second ROADM node, and an optical transmission line establishing optical communication between the first ROADM node and the second ROADM node. The optical transmission line including an in-line amplifier node having a total input power and a total output power. The in-line amplifier node has a first monitoring tool configured to measure input optical power of the in-line amplifier node, and a second monitoring tool configured to measure output optical power of the in-line amplifier node. A software defined L0 network controller has circuitry configured to receive the optical power measured by the first and second monitoring tools from the in-line amplifier node, and to configure at least one of a gain and a gain tilt of the in-line amplifier node.

Methods, systems, and optical power controllers are disclosed. Various problems caused by the use of a single L0 power controller in the prior art are addressed by using first and second L0 power controllers with the first L0 power controller managing first optical components with the optical network, and the second L0 power controller managing second optical components within the optical network.

A system for loading a fiber optic transport system includes a wavelength selective switch (WSS) having inputs and an output connected to an optical fiber, wherein the inputs are connected to one or more lines having data-bearing channels thereon; and an amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) generator connected to one of the inputs of the WSS, wherein the WSS is configured to perform a channel addition through substitution of an ASE channel from the ASE generator for a data-bearing channel, and a channel deletion through substitution of a data-bearing channel for an ASE channel from the ASE generator, and wherein, to limit perturbations on the optical fiber due to channel additions and deletions, the WSS is configured to limit a number of channels that are switched at a same time for a set of channel additions or deletions.

Devices, computer-readable media and methods are disclosed for verifying that an optical transmit/receive device is correctly installed. For example, a processing system including at least one processor may activate a first light source of an optical transmit/receive device of a telecommunication network and detect a receiving of a light from the first light source at a port of an optical add/drop multiplexer of the telecommunication network. The processing system may then verify the optical transmit/receive device and the port of the optical add/drop multiplexer match a network provisioning order, when the receiving of the light from the first light source is detected, and may generate an indication that the optical transmit/receive device is correctly installed, when the optical transmit/receive device and the port of the optical add/drop multiplexer match the network provisioning order.

Systems and methods for performing connectivity verification testing and topology discovery in a reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer (ROADM) are provided. The ROADM can include a ROADM block having a plurality of internal ports connected to a fiber shuffle via respective optical fibers. The ROADM block includes a test signal transmitter configured to inject an outgoing test signal having a unique signature into each internal port. The outgoing test signals are out-of-band of optical data signals traversing the ROADM. The ROADM block includes a test signal monitor configured to monitor for incoming test signals at each of the internal ports. The test signal monitor is configured to validate, based on a signature of an incoming test signal received at an internal port of the ROADM block, whether a valid connection exists between the internal port and an internal port of a second ROADM block.

The disclosed technology is generally directed to optical networking. In one example of the technology, a layer one optical connection between an edge node and a first cloud data center node along a reserved spectrum is controlled. Controlling the layer one optical connection between the edge node and the first cloud data center node includes controlling photonics along the reserved spectrum in an optical path from the edge node to a stub of an optical route node. The optical route node is in an optical route between the first cloud data center node and a second cloud data center node. Controlling the layer one optical connection between the edge node and the first cloud data center node also includes controlling photonics along the reserved spectrum from the optical route node to the first data center node.

A pluggable electric connector can communicate a communication data signal and a control signal with an optical communication device. An optical signal output unit is configured to be capable of selectively output a wavelength of an optical signal. An optical power adjustment unit-can adjust optical power of the optical signal. A pluggable optical receptor can output the optical signal to an optical fiber. A control unit controls a wavelength change operation according to the control signal. The control unit, according to a wavelength change command, commands the optical power adjustment unit to block output of the optical signal, commands the light signal output unit to change the wavelength of the optical signal after the optical signal is blocked, and commands the light signal output unit and the optical power adjustment unit to output the optical signal after the wavelength change operation.

We describe a wavelength division multiplexed (WDM) reconfigurable optical switch, the switch comprising: a set of arrays of optical beam connections, each comprising an array of optical outputs and having an optical input to receive a WDM input optical signal; a first diffractive element to demultiplexed said WDM input optical signal into a plurality of demultiplexed optical input beams, and to disperse said demultiplexed optical input beams spatially along a first axis; first relay optics between said set of arrays of optical beam connections and said first diffractive element; and a reconfigurable holographic array comprising a 2D array of reconfigurable sub-holograms defining sub-hologram rows and columns; wherein said arrays of said set of arrays are at least one dimensional arrays extending spatially in a direction parallel to said first axis and arranged in a column defining a second axis orthogonal to said first axis; wherein said sub-hologram rows are aligned along said first axis, and wherein said sub-hologram columns are aligned along said second axis; wherein a number of said sub-hologram rows corresponds to a number of arrays in said set of arrays; and wherein each sub-hologram row is configured to receive a set of demultiplexed optical input beams at different carrier wavelengths demultiplexed from the optical input for the array of the set of arrays to which the row corresponds; wherein each of said sub-holograms in a sub-hologram row is reconfigurable to steer a respective wavelength channel of the WDM input signal for the array to which the sub-hologram row corresponds, towards a selected said optical output for the array; and wherein each said sub-hologram row is configured to steer the demultiplexed optical input beams for a respective array of the set of arrays of optical beam connections.

Systems and methods for controlling optical powers of optical channels in an optical communications network comprising a plurality of nodes is described herein. The method comprises obtaining a reference optical power. The method also includes determining an optical power of an optical channel generated by an optical transmitter of a node. The method further includes applying an attenuation to the optical channel to reduce the optical power of the optical channel to the reference optical power. In some implementations, the method is performed by a network controller operating in the optical communications network.

Optical networks, transponders and single-laser coherent transceiver are described. The single-laser coherent transceiver includes a wavelength source, a transmitter and a receiver. The wavelength source is tuned to supply a first optical signal having a first wavelength. The transmitter receives the first optical signal and encodes client data into the first optical signal to generate a second optical signal. The receiver receives the first optical signal from the wavelength source and a fraction of the second optical signal.