Systems and methods are disclosed that may be implemented for network management system (NMS) configuration management support for network devices using a learning and natural language processing application to capture the usage and behavior of the Command Line Interface (CLI) of a network device with the aid of a CLI knowledge model, which in one example may be ontology-based.

Within a radio communication network infrastructure transmitting data organized into a sequence of symbols to a receiving device over a plurality of radio links, data to be transmitted is encoded according to an error correction coding scheme in order to produce a set of systematic symbols and a set of corresponding redundancy symbols; the systematic symbols and a first subset of the corresponding redundancy symbols are transmitted, over a first radio link among said plurality of radio links, in broadcast mode, and a second subset of the corresponding redundancy symbols, distinct from the first one, is transmitted over a second radio link among said plurality of radio links.

The present invention relates to methods for preparing a degradable polymer network. The methods for preparing a degradable polymer network comprise a) preparing a polymer composition comprising monomers of cyclic carbonates and/or cyclic esters and/or linear carbonates and/or linear esters and/or cyclic ethers and/or linear hydroxycarboxylic acids at a temperature between 20° C. and 200° C.; b) adding a cross-linking reagent comprising at least one double or triple C—C bond and/or a cross-linking radical initiator; c) processing the polymer composition (that contains the crosslinking reagent into a desired shape; d) Crosslinking by irradiating the mixture. Further, the present invention relates to a degradable polymer network. Furthermore, the present invention relates to the use of the degradable polymer network.

This disclosure provides a network security architecture that permits installation of different software security products as virtual machines (VMs). By relying on a standardized data format and communication structure, a general architecture can be created and used to dynamically build and reconfigure interaction between both similar and dissimilar security products. Use of an integration scheme having defined message types and specified query response framework provides for real-time response and easy adaptation for cross-vendor communication. Examples are provided where an intrusion detection system (IDS) can be used to detect network threats based on distributed threat analytics, passing detected threats to other security products (e.g., products with different capabilities from different vendors) to trigger automatic, dynamically configured communication and reaction. A network security provider using this infrastructure can provide hosted or managed boundary security to a diverse set of clients, each on a customized basis.

A dispersed storage network memory includes a pool of storage nodes, where the pool of storage nodes stores a multitude of encoded data files. A storage node obtains and analyzes data access response performance data for each of the storage nodes to produce a modified data access response plan that includes identity of an undesired performing storage node and an alternative data access response for the undesired performing storage node. The storage nodes receive corresponding portions of a data access request for at least a portion of one of the multitude of encoded data files. The undesired performing storage node or another storage node processes one of the corresponding portions of the data access request in accordance with the alternative data access response.

Some embodiments provide a method for managing a logical switching element that includes several logical ports. The logical switching element receives and sends data packets through the logical ports. The logical switching element is implemented in a set of managed switching elements that forward data packets in a network. The method provides a set of tables for specifying forwarding behaviors of the logical switching element. The method performs a set of database join operations on the tables to specify in the tables that the logical forwarding element drops a data packet received through a first logical port when the data packet is headed to a second logical port different than the first logical port.

A method and circuit arrangement utilize a low latency variable transfer network between the register files of multiple processing cores in a multi-core processor chip to support fine grained parallelism of virtual threads across multiple hardware threads. The communication of a variable over the variable transfer network may be initiated by a move from a local register in a register file of a source processing core to a variable register that is allocated to a destination hardware thread in a destination processing core, so that the destination hardware thread can then move the variable from the variable register to a local register in the destination processing core.

An array of a plurality of processing elements (PEs) are in a data packet-switched network interconnecting the PEs and memory to enable any of the PEs to access the memory. The network connects the PEs and their local memories to a common controller. The common controller may include a shared load/store (SLS) unit and an array control unit. A shared read may be addressed to an external device via the common controller. The SLS unit can continue activity as if a normal shared read operation has taken place, except that the transactions that have been sent externally may take more cycles to complete than the local shared reads. Hence, a number of transaction-enabled flags may not have been deactivated even though there is no more bus activity. The SLS unit can use this state to indicate to the array control unit that a thread switch may now take place.

The invention relates to compressed data transmission in wireless data communication. Disclosed are methods and apparatuses for transporting residue of vehicle position data via a wireless network. A disclosed method for transporting residue of vehicle position data via a wireless network, includes the steps of: receiving data for updating residue encoding schema from a monitoring server; constructing a residue encoding schema based on the data, thereby producing a constructed residue encoding schema; and storing the constructed residue encoding schema such that the constructed residue encoding schema will become the current residue encoding schema; where: the constructed residue encoding schema is constructed such that each residue of the constructed residue encoding schema corresponds to a code; and the constructed residue encoding schema is constructed such that a residue having a relatively high probability of occurrence corresponds to a code of relatively short length.

Vehicle event recorder systems are arranged to be in constant communication with remote servers and administrators via mobile wireless cellular networks. Vehicle event recorders equipped with video cameras capture video and other data records of important events relating to vehicle use. These data are then transmitted over special communications networks having very high coverage space but limited bandwidth. A vehicle may be operated over very large region while maintaining continuous communications connections with a remote fixed server. As such, systems of these inventions may be characterized as including a mobile unit having: a video camera; a microprocessor; memory; an event trigger; and mobile wireless transceivers, and a fixed network portion including: mobile wireless cellular network, a protocol translation gateway, the Internet and an application-specific server.

Methods for the design of microwave filters comprises comprising preferably the steps of inputting a first set of filter requirements, inputting a selection of circuit element types, inputting a selection of lossless circuit response variables, calculating normalized circuit element values based on the input parameters, and generate a first circuit, insert parasitic effects to the normalized circuit element values of the first circuit, and output at least the first circuit including the post-parasitic effect circuit values. Additional optional steps include: requirements to a normalized design space, performing an equivalent circuit transformation, unmapping the circuit to a real design space, performing a survey, and element removal optimization. Computer implement software, systems, and microwave filters designed in accordance with the method are included.

In one embodiment, a method includes accessing a social graph that includes a plurality of nodes and edges, receiving from a first user a voice message comprising one or more commands, receiving location information associated with the first user, identifying edges and nodes in the social graph based on the location information, where each of the identified edges and nodes corresponds to at least one of the commands of the voice message, and generating new nodes or edges in the social graph based on the identified nodes or identified edges.

A method for configuring an interactive platform for monitoring the performance and the quality of a computer network, the monitoring data being suitable to be displayed on a dynamic page of type webpage in a form of graphic components called “displets”; including providing, on the interactive platform a configuration interface in which are defined, for at least one given user, filtering criteria for displaying displets, the criteria being defined in the form of parameters for configuring the rights of the at least one user.

A system receives a first request for data associated with a data stream received over a first network from a remote source and then determines when the requested data will be available based on analyzing the data stream. The system communicates a second request for the requested data over a second network to the remote source when the requested data will not be available from the data stream within a threshold time and receives the requested data from the remote source over at least one from the list including the first network and the second network.

In V2V or other networks in which multiple video cameras can share video data, a network participant ordinarily has the option of selecting a particular video data stream (either generated by local cameras or received from other network participants. To facilitate the process of selecting a video data stream for presentation, the user's vehicle (in a V2V network) receives video data streams generated by other network participants along with identifiers indicating the video data stream actually being presented to the sender. The receiving system identifies the received video data stream by the greatest number of network participants and displays the identified video data stream on the user's in-vehicle video display.

A method begins by a router receiving data for storage and interpreting the data to determine whether the data is to be forwarded or error encoded. The method continues with the router obtaining a routing table when the data is to be error encoded. Next, the method continues with the router selecting a routing option from the plurality of routing options and determining error coding dispersal storage function parameters based on the routing option. Next, the method continues with the router encoding the data based on the error coding dispersal storage function parameters to produce a plurality of sets of encoded data slices. Next, the method continues with the router outputting at least some of the encoded data slices of a set of the plurality of sets of encoded data slices to an entry point of the routing option.

A system, method, and computer-readable medium are disclosed for realizing server management functionalities in the absence of a routable Internet Protocol (IP) network address of a remote access controller (RAC). A first device, which is operatively coupled to a link-local network, generates a Multicast Domain Name System (mDNS) IP multicast query message, which it then sends to a second device on the link-local network. In response, the second device, which comprises a RAC, returns its link-local IP address to the first device.

Systems, methods, and computer-readable and executable instructions are provided for providing a simulated network. Providing a simulated network can include collecting a number of network parameters for a plurality of locations and determining an application frequency of an application for the plurality of locations. Furthermore, providing a simulated network can include providing a simulated network with the number of network parameters to a number of testers of the application, wherein the number of network parameters are provided proportionally to the application frequency.

The system and method described herein may leverage passive and active vulnerability discovery to identify network addresses and open ports associated with connections that one or more passive scanners observed in a network and current connections that one or more active scanners enumerated in the network. The observed and enumerated current connections may be used to model trust relationships and identify exploitable weak points in the network, wherein the exploitable weak points may include hosts that have exploitable services, exploitable client software, and/or exploitable trust relationships. Furthermore, an attack that uses the modeled trust relationships to target the exploitable weak points on a selected host in the network may be simulated to enumerate remote network addresses that could compromise the network and determine an exploitation path that the enumerated remote network addresses could use to compromise the network.

Methods and systems for remotely provisioning applications from the cloud in secure environments with robust license control failover options using a hierarchical server topology. Cloud-based servers provide applications and licenses to an organization's local servers, which in turn serve applications and licenses to end user devices. By synchronizing information including license and application provision information among the local and cloud-based servers, an organization's local servers can continue to serve applications and licenses when one or more of the organization's local servers fail.

A network is described for providing estimates of the current time. The network includes multiple computer systems each configured to provide an estimate of the current time in response to a received request. The computer systems are logically arranged to form a hierarchical structure, wherein the hierarchical structure includes multiple levels ranked with respect to one another. Each of the computer systems is assigned one of multiple levels of trust, and occupies one of the levels of the hierarchical structure dependent upon the assigned level of trust. The level of trust assigned to a given computer system is dependent upon a timekeeping dependability of the given computer system. The assigned level of trust may also be dependent upon a timekeeping security of the given computer system, where the timekeeping security is dependent upon a tamper resistance of the time clock of the given computer system. Methods for delegating a level of trust to a new computer system (i.e., a computer system not part of the network) and for adding a new computer system to the network are also described.

Methods and systems for load balancing read/write requests of a virtualized storage system. In one embodiment, a storage system includes a plurality of physical storage devices and a storage module operable within a communication network to present the plurality of physical storage devices as a virtual storage device to a plurality of network computing elements that are coupled to the communication network. The virtual storage device comprises a plurality of virtual storage volumes, wherein each virtual storage volume is communicatively coupled to the physical storage devices via the storage module. The storage module comprises maps that are used to route read/write requests from the network computing elements to the virtual storage volumes. Each map links read/write requests from at least one network computing element to a respective virtual storage volume within the virtual storage device.

A method begins with a processing module obtaining data to store and determining whether substantially similar data to the data is stored. When the substantially similar data is not stored, the method continues with the processing module generating a first encryption key based on the data, encoding the first encryption key into encoded data slices in accordance with an error coding dispersal storage function, and storing the encoded data slices in a dispersed storage network (DSN) memory. The method continues with the processing module encrypting the data using an encryption key of the substantially similar data in accordance with an encryption function to produce encrypted data, compressing the encrypted data in accordance with a compression function to produce compressed data, storing the compressed data when the substantially similar data is stored.

A source device to provide power through a network cable and a user device is to draw power from the network cable. A database is to store a parameter associated with the user device. The source device is to access the stored parameter based on receipt of information related to the user device and is to compare at least one of a current power drawn and an additional power requested by the user device to a power limit of the user device based on the accessed parameters. The source device is to send a power message to the user device based on the comparison, the power message to relate to an amount of the power the user device is to draw.

A power-saving network management server, which is coupled to a network system including a network device and manages a state of power to the network device, wherein the power-saving network management server is configured to: store network configuration information and task allocation information; determine starting or stopping of the power supply to the port of the network device based on the updated network configuration information and task allocation information; store a determination result of the starting or stopping of the power supply to the port as a port determination result; and control the power supply to the port of the network device based on the port determination result.

Methods, devices, and systems that may be used to secure networked devices are provided. One method includes receiving, at a security device, encrypted configuration data from a management server connected to a data network, from packets addressed to a networked device. The method further includes managing, by the security device, packets between the networked device and other devices accessible through a network based upon the configuration data. The method further includes sending, by the security device, a plurality of encrypted heartbeat messages to the management server utilizing an address associated with the networked device as the originating address for packets in which the encrypted heartbeat messages are transmitted.

A method of accessing a communication system and a communication device for performing the same are disclosed. The method includes transmitting, by a communication device to a node of a communication system through a communication link between the communication device and the node, a request to negotiate basic capabilities for communicating with the node, receiving, by the communication device from the node, a response to the request to negotiate basic capabilities, and, transmitting, by the communication device to the node, a request to disconnect the communication link, when the response to the request to negotiate basic capabilities indicates that the node does not support authentication.

A composition of matter comprising an interpenetrating polymer network of a combination of a silanol-containing polysiloxane phase and a silylated triglyceride oil phase. The two phases are mixed and covalently bound to each other via siloxane crosslinks. A method for producing interpenetrating polymer networks. The method comprises providing triglycerides from oils or fats and reacting the triglycerides with a reactive silane to form a silylated triglyceride oil. The silylated triglyceride oil and a silanol terminated polysiloxane are emulsified with water in a predetermined ratio. Thereafter, crosslinking agents are added and the water is removed from the emulsions providing siloxane crosslinks between the two intimately mixed immiscible phases.

A method for providing a biological logic gate comprising the following steps: subjecting a bistable autoregulatory gene network (GRN) to a noisy background; identifying adjustable parameters of the GRN; using logical stochastic resonance to determine values of the GRN parameters which result in the GRN performing different logic gate functions; and setting the parameter values of the GRN such that the GRN performs a first logic gate function.

Provided is an operating method of a sensor node. The operating method of a sensor node includes receiving a sensing request, adjusting a sensing condition on the basis of the received sensing request, and sensing according to the adjusted sensing condition.

A system for intelligent monitoring and management of an electrical system is disclosed. The system includes a data acquisition component, a power analytics server and a client terminal. The data acquisition component acquires real-time data output from the electrical system. The power analytics server is comprised of a real-time energy pricing engine, virtual system modeling engine, an analytics engine, a machine learning engine and a schematic user interface creator engine. The real-time energy pricing engine generates real-time utility power pricing data. The virtual system modeling engine generates predicted data output for the electrical system. The analytics engine monitors real-time data output and predicted data output of the electrical system. The machine learning engine stores acid processes patterns observed from the real-time data output and the predicted data output to forecast an aspect of the electrical system.

Methods, systems, and computer readable media for simulating realistic movement of user equipment in an LTE network are disclosed. According to one method, a logical topology of a long term evolution (LTE) access network is defined that includes defining connections between one or more eNodeBs (eNBs). A physical topology of the LTE access network is defined that includes defining locations of the eNBs and sectors, where the physical network topology is mapped to the logical network topology. One or more problem areas are defined within the physical network topology, where the one or more problem areas include locations where signal quality is degraded. One or more paths are defined through the physical network topology. A traffic profile for a user equipment (UE) device is defined. A plurality of messages is generated for simulating the movement of a UE device along a path through the physical network topology.

A mode-based method of social networking comprising storing in a database profile information for a plurality of users, event information for a plurality of events and a mode associated with each event, receiving by a plurality of computerized user devices a selection of a mode and one or more geographic proximity parameter selections from a each of plurality of users, displaying, event information for an event having a same mode as the first user, profile information for one or more other users among the plurality of users having selected the same mode as the first user and located within a geographic proximity parameter selected by the first user, and a density of a plurality of users located within the geographic proximity parameter selected by the first user wherein the density is represented by a color corresponding to the mode.

An example method transmits a path message to an egress node, via intermediate nodes, that configures OAM monitoring of an entire connection between an ingress node and the egress node and also configures OAM monitoring of at least one segment of the connection shorter than the entire connection by at least one intermediate node. The path message comprises a LSP attributes object and an ERO. The LSP object comprises technology-specific attributes defining descriptors for configuring the egress node in accordance with a communication protocol utilized for the connection; and technology-independent OAM parameters that, irrespective of the communication protocol, define an OAM type to be used by the egress node, and define desired monitoring actions for the egress node to perform. The ERO comprises a respective HOP Attributes sub-object for configuring each of the at least one intermediate nodes. Each HOP Attributes sub-object also comprises technology-specific attributes and technology-independent OAM parameters.

Method and arrangement for network resource management in a communication network, especially related to transfer of content. A content resource broker is introduced, which dynamically manages resources based on the size of the content to be transferred. The method and arrangement involve the obtaining of information on current and future network capacity, which is available for transfer of content; the receiving of a request from a requesting entity concerning resources for transfer of a content C; and the determining of whether the available network capacity within a predetermined response time is sufficient for transferring the content C before the predetermined response time has expired.

A technique dynamically configures and verifies routing information of broadcast networks using link state protocols in a computer network. According to the novel technique, a router within the broadcast network receives a link state protocol routing information advertisement from an advertising router, e.g., a designated router or other adjacent neighbor. The router learns of a next-hop router (“next-hop”) to reach a particular destination from the advertisement, and determines whether the next-hop is located within the same broadcast network (e.g., subnet) as the designated router. If so, the router further determines whether the next-hop is directly addressable (i.e., reachable), such as, e.g., by checking for link adjacencies to the next-hop or by sending request/reply messages (e.g., echo messages or “ping” messages) to the next-hop. In the event the next-hop for the destination is not directly addressable by the router (e.g., no adjacency or reply), the router installs a route to the destination via the designated router. Otherwise, the router installs a route to the destination via the next-hop.

Various aspects of a method and system for low-latency networking are provided. Latency requirements of traffic to be communicated along a network path comprising one or more Ethernet links may be determined. A maximum size of Ethernet frames utilized for communicating the traffic may be determined based on the latency requirements. The maximum size of the Ethernet frames may be determined based on a data rate of one or more Ethernet links along the network path. A single device may utilize different maximum packet sizes for different ports/links on which it communicates. One or more messages indicating the determined maximum size may be communicated among devices along the network path to coordinate maximum packet sizes.

A virtual computer system includes virtualization software, and one or more physical network interfaces for connecting to one or more computer networks. The virtualization software supports one or more virtual machines (VMs), and exports one or more virtual network interfaces to the VM(s) to enable the VM(s) to access the computer network(s) through the physical network interface(s). The virtualization software modifies and filters network data frames from the VM(s) and from the physical network interface(s) to restrict one or more VMs to one or more virtual local area networks (VLANs) that are implemented within a VLAN topology. Restricting a VM to a VLAN limits the broadcast domain to which the VM belongs, which may reduce security risks facing the VM. Implementing the VLAN functionality within the virtualization software provides the functionality to every VM in the computer system, without requiring every VM to provide the functionality.

Systems and methods provide a parameterized scheduling system that incorporates end-user application awareness and can be used with scheduling groups that contain data streams from heterogeneous applications. Individual data queues within a scheduling group can be created based on application class, specific application, individual data streams or some combination thereof. Application information and Application Factors (AF) are used to modify scheduler parameters such as weights and credits to differentiate between data streams assigned to a scheduling group. Dynamic AF settings may adjust relative importance of user applications to maximize user Quality of Experience (QoE) in response to recurring network patterns, one-time events, application characteristics, protocol characteristics, device characteristics, service level agreements, or combinations thereof. Scheduling parameters may be dynamic and incorporate the notions of “duration neglect” and “recency effect” in an end-user's perception of video quality in order to optimally manage video traffic during periods of congestion.

A multi-participant conference system and method is described. The multi-participant system includes a PSTN client, at least one remote client and a first participant client. The PSTN client communicates audio data and the remote clients communicate audio-video data. The first participant client includes a voice over IP (VoIP) encoder, a VoIP decoder, a first audio mixer, and a second audio mixer. The VoIP encoder compresses audio data transported to the PSTN client. The VoIP decoder then decodes audio data from the PSTN client. The first audio mixer mixes the decoded audio data from the PSTN client with the audio-video data from the first participant into a first mixed audio-video data stream transmitted to the remote client. The second audio mixer mixes the audio-video data stream from the first participant with the audio-video data stream from each remote client into a second mixed audio transmitted to the PSTN client.

A double ring network system configured with two or more transmission stations each including a pair of bi-directionally communicative communication ports, including any adjacent two transmission stations as terminal stations, and any transmission station as a base, as mutually connected in a ring form by communication ports through a transmission line, for intercommunications between transmission stations, in which the transmission stations are each adapted to determine whether or not frame signals are received from adjacent transmission stations, transmit route identifying frame signals for identification of routes to adjacent transmission stations, when having failed in reception, and set own station as a terminal station substituting for a current terminal station, when having received no responses to the route identifying frames from adjacent transmission stations, so they are kept from arriving at ring-like connected subsequent transmission stations.

A network system has: a communication device configured to perform frame transmission and reception; a network configured to transfer the frame; a gateway connected between the communication device and the network; and a controller configured to perform management of the communication device and the network. The frame is classified into a control frame for communicating control information necessary for communication and a data frame for communicating data between communication devices. The gateway determines whether a frame received from a source communication device is the control frame or the data frame, forwards the control frame to the controller, and forwards the data frame to the network. The controller performs the management based on the control frame received from the gateway. The network transfers the data frame received from the gateway to a destination communication device without through the controller.

A network component comprising at least one processor coupled to a memory and configured to exchange security information using a plurality of attributes in a management entity (ME) in an optical network unit (ONU) via an ONU management control interface (OMCI) channel, wherein the attributes provide security features for the ONU and an optical line terminal (OLT). Also included is an apparatus comprising an ONU configured to couple to an OLT and comprising an OMCI ME, wherein the OMCI ME comprises a plurality of attributes that support a plurality of security features for transmissions between the ONU and the OLT, and wherein the attributes are communicated via an OMCI channel between the ONU and the OLT and provide the security features for the ONU and the OLT.

The disclosure provides a method and a system for detecting a fiber fault in a Passive Optical Network (PON). The system comprises an optical path detection device, a Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) coupler, a wavelength selection coupler, a branch fiber selector and a wavelength selection router. The detection system is attached to an original PON system, without influencing the operation of the original system while performing the detection. With the disclosure, the problem of being unable to determine whether there is a fault in a branch fiber due to the loss of an optical path detection reflection signal is solved, the branch fiber with a fault can be quickly located and fixed, thus the operational and maintenance costs of an operator are reduced.

A system and method are disclosed for transporting deterministic traffic in a gigabit passive optical network. A system that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, an Optical Line Termination (OLT) for exchanging data traffic in a Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) having a controller programmed to generate a timeslot schedule for transport of a desired bandwidth of constant bit rate (CBR) data traffic by selecting one or more timeslots from periodic frame clusters operating according to a GPON Transmission Convergence (GTC) protocol. Additional embodiments are disclosed.

Embodiments of the present disclosure provide methods for allocating bandwidth to a plurality of traffic containers of a passive optical network. The method comprises receiving upstream data from a plurality of traffic containers of the passive optical network and passing the upstream data to a traffic manager. The method further comprises dynamically changing the allocated bandwidth based at least in part on the amount of the upstream data stored in one or more queues of the traffic manager.

An apparatus and method for fault indication and localization in a Passive Optical Network (PON) comprising a multistage power splitter (100, 200, 300) with at least one 1:N splitter (120, 221, 222, 321, 322) followed by N items of 2:M splitters (131, 132, 231-233, 331-336), wherein N and M are integers greater than 1. The apparatus also comprises an Optical Time Domain Reflectometry (OTDR) device (110, 210, 310) capable of inserting an OTDR signal into the power splitter (100, 200, 300), and adapted to insert the OTDR signal between the first stage of the at least one 1:N splitter (120, 221, 222, 321, 322) and the second N items of 2:M splitters (131, 132, 231-233, 331-336).

An optical transport network system includes a plurality of NEs, each transmitting wavelength-multiplexed optical signals. Each NE includes a routing information DB that is used to store reachable area information, which contains identifiers of other NEs in a range within which the optical signals can be transmitted from the own NE without using an REG. A FROM NE includes a path candidate searching unit that searches for a plurality of path candidates for transmitting optical signals from the FROM NE to a TO NE. The TO NE includes a path selecting unit that selects a path for transmitting optical signals from among a plurality of path candidates. The path selecting unit obtains the number of times for which the REG is used for each of the plurality of path candidates; and, based on each number of times that is obtained, selects a path for transmitting the optical signals.

An optical line termination node has a first connection arrangement for connecting a working fiber, a second connection arrangement for connecting a protection fiber, a transceiver arrangement having first primary link and a first secondary link, and protection switching means configured for being switched either in a working operating state or in a protection operating state.

This invention relates to provisioning wavelength-selective switches and reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexers to minimize the bandwidth narrowing effect from the optical filters. Novel architectures and methods are disclosed that can significantly reduce bandwidth-narrowing on channels in a reconfigurable WDM network where a large number of optical filter elements are cascaded. Instead of blocking unused channels as in the prior art, unused channels are selectively provisioned depending on the state of their adjacent channels. Unused adjacent channels of an active channel are provisioned to follow the same path as the active channels. As each channels is deployed, the channel frequency is selected so as to minimize bandwidth narrowing.