SONET: now it's the standard optical network

The authors discuss aspects of the SONET (synchronous optical network) standards and standardization process, both national and international, that they consider to be of particular interest. Restricting their attention to the standard dealing with rates and formats, they consider the SONET signal hierarchy, overhead channels, multiplexing, STS-1 payload pointer, sub-STS-1 payloads, and optical interface parameters. They include a brief history of the SONET standard and an outline of future work.<<ETX>>