pseudowire

Pseudowire ( sometimes spelled as "pseudo wire" or abbreviated as PW) is a mechanism for emulating various networking or telecommunications services across packet-switched networks that use Ethernet, IP, or MPLS. Services emulated can include T1 leased line, frame relay, Ethernet, ATM, TDM, or SONET/SDH. As defined in RFC 3985 ("Pseudo Wire Emulation Edge-to-Edge [PWE3] Architecture") a pseudowire delivers the bare minimum of functionality necessary to emulate a wire with some required degree of fidelity for some specific service definition.

Download this free guide

Download: Overcome Virtual Network Management Challenges

The virtualized network poses challenges to network management systems -- and as more hardware components become virtualized, that challenge becomes even greater. This handbook discusses the steps IT must take to both build and corral their virtualized infrastructure.

Start Download

• Corporate E-mail Address:

  You forgot to provide an Email Address.

  This email address doesn’t appear to be valid.

  This email address is already registered. Please login.

  You have exceeded the maximum character limit.

  Please provide a Corporate E-mail Address.

• • I agree to TechTarget’s Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, and the transfer of my information to the United States for processing to provide me with relevant information as described in our Privacy Policy.

  Please check the box if you want to proceed.

• • I agree to my information being processed by TechTarget and its Partners to contact me via phone, email, or other means regarding information relevant to my professional interests. I may unsubscribe at any time.

  Please check the box if you want to proceed.

By submitting my Email address I confirm that I have read and accepted the Terms of Use and Declaration of Consent.

Required functions for PWs include the following:

• Encapsulating service-specific bit streams, cells, or protocol data units (PDUs) that appear at some ingress port, then ferrying them across some IP path or through an MPLS tunnel.
• Occasionally managing order and timing of incoming PW traffic so as to properly emulate a service with the necessary fidelity (TDM and ATM are good examples where timing issues are very important).

Seen from the perspective of customer edge equipment (CE), a PW appears to be an unshared link or a circuit for some designated service. PWs provide a relatively straightforward mechanism to implement arbitrary services across packet-switched networks, and to achieve interoperability among arbitrary sets of equipment from multiple vendors.