ETHERNET OAM SERVICES Ethernet OAM is a broad topic, but this article focuses on two main areas that

are most in need by service providers and are rapidly evolving in the standards bodies: Service OAM and Link OAM. These two OAM protocols have unique objectives but are complementary to each other. Service OAM provides monitoring and troubleshooting of end-to-end Ethernet service instances, while Link OAM allows a provider to monitor and troubleshoot an individual Ethernet link. A customer service instance, or Ethernet Virtual Connection (EVC) as defined by the MEF, is the service that is sold to a customer and is typically designated by a VLAN tag on the User-toNetwork Interface (UNI). The EVC is typically switched natively with Ethernet, or sometimes maps into a pseudowire. Service OAM thus operates on a per-EVC basis and does not care whether the underlying transport is native Ethernet, Ethernet over SONET, Ethernet over MPLS, or any other variant. It enables the service provider to know if an EVC has failed, and if so, provides the tools to rapidly isolate the failure. Ethernet CFM relies on a functional model consisting of hierarchical Maintenance Domains. A Maintenance Domain is an Administrative Domain for the purpose of managing and administering a network. A Maintenance Domain is defined by provisioning which switch/router ports are interior to the Domain. In addition, Maintenance End Points are designated on the edge ports for that domain for each EVC, and Maintenance Intermediate Points are designated on relevant interior ports.

Ethernet OAM Connectivity Fault Management comprises of four categories of messages that work in orchestra to aid the Administrator in monitoring and debugging Ethernet Networks. These are: Connectivity Check Messages, Path trace Messages, Loopback Messages, and Alarm Indication Signal Messages.

Continuity Check Messages (CC): These are heart-beat multicast messages issued periodically by Maintenance End Points. They allow Maintenance End Points to detect loss of service connectivity amongst themselves. They also allow Maintenance End Points to discover other Maintenance End Points within a Domain, and allow Maintenance Intermediate Points to discover Maintenance End Points. Path Trace Messages: These are transmitted by a Maintenance End Point on the request of the Administrator to track the path (hop-by-hop) to a destination Maintenance End Point. They allow the transmitting node to discover vital connectivity data about the path. It is similar in concept to UDP Traceroute. Loopback Messages: These are transmitted by a Maintenance End Point on the request of the Administrator to verify connectivity to a particular Maintenance Intermediate Point or Maintenance End Point. Loopback indicates whether the target maintenance point is reachable or not - it does not allow hop-by-hop discovery of the path. It is similar in concept to ICMP Echo (Ping). Alarm Indication Signal (AIS) Messages: Provide notification to other elements in the network that there is a fault in the Metro Ethernet network.