OAM Feature Overview

An important behavior of a carrier-class network element is the implementation of OAM capabilities. These capabilities relate to operational fields, such as link monitoring, fault signaling, and remote loopback across multi-vendor equipment, administrative boundaries, and diversified physical locations. OAM capabilities currently exist in ATM and SONET infrastructures. With the continued upgrade to Ethernet-based infrastructures, comparable OAM functions at the MAC (802.3) level are essential. The IEEE 802.3 CSMA/CD Working Group, using its Ethernet in First Mile (802.3ah) task force, defined a set of OAM enhancements for Ethernet links in the 802.3ah standard. These enhancements gracefully ensure backward compatibility with existing Ethernet implementations, while also providing advanced monitoring functionality required in public networks.

JunosE Software supports the following OAM features:

• OAM Discovery Feature
• OAM Link Monitoring Feature
• OAM Remote Fault Detection Feature
• OAM Remote and Local Loopback Feature