Patent attributes
Systems and methods for providing onsite support to technicians of a network include a hardware means for automatically detecting the presence of an onsite technician at the network node, and providing support to the onsite technician through a communications channel provided by the network node. The communications channel can be an optical service channel or a general communication channel (GCC) configured according to G.709 standard, for example. The hardware means can be further configured to determine an identity of the onsite technician and/or authenticate the onsite technician. The hardware means may comprise a dongle communicatively coupled to a network element or shelf at the network node via a universal serial bus (USB) port or BLUETOOTH connection.
