Optical Network Control: Architecture, Protocols, and Standards

9.5. P-NNI

P-NNI routing and signaling protocols are used to discover an ATM network topology, create a database of topology information, and route ATM virtual circuits over the discovered topology [ATMF02]. Under the P-NNI model, the network is viewed as a multilevel hierarchy. Each level in the hierarchy consists of one or more entities known as the peer group. The constituents of the peer group vary depending on the level of the hierarchy. At the lowest level of the hierarchy, the peer groups consist of network elements, namely, the switches. As we move up in the hierarchy, the peer groups consist of abstract nodes representing peer groups at the lower layers. The structure of the P-NNI hierarchy, P-NNI peer groups, peer group leader, and ...