Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF)

The Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) promotes the development and deployment of interoperable networking solutions and services through the creation of implementation agreements for optical networking products, network processing elements, and component technologies.

Implementation agreements will be based on requirements developed cooperatively by end-users, service providers, equipment vendors and technology providers, and aligned with worldwide standards, augmented if necessary. This is accomplished through industry member participation working together to develop specifications for: external network element interfaces; software interfaces internal to network elements; and hardware component interfaces internal to network elements.

The OIF creates benchmarks, perform worldwide interoperability testing, build market awareness and promote education for technologies, services and solutions. The OIF also provides feedback to worldwide standards organizations to help achieve a set of implementable, interoperable solutions.