The OAM protocol can
be implemented in hardware or software, thus providing the desired media independence
and flexibility required??”especially for legacy equipment where hardware changes are
highly unwelcome and software alternations are limited in scope. OAM frames target
the slow protocol MAC address (standard defined) and are intercepted by the MAC
sublayer and thus do not propagate across multiple hops in an Ethernet network,
assuring the OAM protocol data units (OAMPDUs) affect only the operation of the
OAM protocol itself, while leaving the contents of the subscriber frames unaltered.
The main supported OAM features and functionalities include
?– Discovery process Defining the process in which OAM-enabled devices discover
their peers on the link and notify each other of their OAM-related capabilities.
?– Link performance monitoring Defining attributes and status information for
Ethernet links through exchange of specialized OAM link performance frames.
?– Remote fault detection Describing means of detecting and handling compromised
links in any underlying Ethernet network infrastructure.
?– Remote loopback Providing means for the testing individual links and segments
by sending test frames through them, based on a generic OAM protocol.
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