Resilience in GMPLS path management: model and mechanism

The recent advent of converging the IP and optical networks has necessitated the development of a generalized multiprotocol label switching framework. Resilience becomes more important than ever before in a GMPLS network since a single cut of an optical fiber may generate hundreds of link and node failures at high layers of the GMPLS architecture. In this article we briefly survey the current work regarding GMPLS recovery management, and present a new resilience-based dynamic GMPLS path management strategy. We present a simple model to represent the resilience requirements in GMPLS path management, and propose fast path management algorithms. The salient feature of the proposed approach is that it enables the paths to be dynamically selected under multiple simultaneous failure occurrences while satisfying the resilience requirement. Backup path design rules are developed, and the condition for backup path availability is derived for the special mesh-type GMPLS network. Finally, a simple example is shown to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed resilience model and path management mechanism.