Recent Advances in Continuous On-line Synchronisation Testing for Telecom Networks

Poor synchronisation in telecommunication networks causes service degradation and even failure. Traditionally, the process of measuring the quality of synchronisation delivery has been complex; it requires dedicated, expensive equipment and detailed knowledge of the relevant International Standards for different nodes within any telecom network. Also, synchronisation knowledge has been confined to a small number of engineers in any given organisation, with synchronisation often seen as a niche discipline, under-funded and underdeveloped. Deploying these valuable and limited resources around a network with suspected synchronisation problems has in the past been a lengthy and costly exercise, typically in response to a major network outage. This paper will discuss a novel approach of widely deploying a number of remote synchronisation measurement probes around a network and propose that synchronisation measurement should become integrated within the network itself.