lucent node architecture-every node has a small electrical switch sitting on top of the optical transparent switch. Regeneration point FIGURE 10.32 Translucent architecture in which Regeneration regenerators are present only as point a transmission aid on long links and all the network management is exactly that of a transparent network. are present only as a transmission aid on long links and all the network management is exactly that of a transparent network. An example of this architecture is reported in Figure 10.32. In this representation, we will call transparent paths the paths that do not experiment regeneration (even if they could traverse regeneration points), and translucid paths those paths that are regenerated at least once. The dimensioning of a translucent network of the kind we are considering is generally performed in two steps: placing of regenerator points and IA-RWA. Several algorithms are presented in literature to carry out the first phase. Due to the fact that in this kind of network the link transmission performances are dominant in the Next Generation Networking: Enabling Technologies, Architectures, and Performances process of placing regenerators and in RWA, many of these algorithms use the shortest path routing policy both in the first and in the second part of the design. The key point is to assign to every link a correct weight to take into account all the rel- evant phenomena. The strategy we want to illustrate here is based on the assumption that propagation can be considered linear all over the network, at least in a first approximation. In the first phase, a weight is linked to each node and to each connection of the network graph that is equal to the degradation in the SNo that a signal undergoes passing through the link or the node. Let us assume that the wavelength-carried signal is generated at the transmitter without noise, that is, with infinite SN. Let us also image that the design of the transmission system is uniform all through the network, SO that everywhere the inter-