Generic structure of an optical burst switching (OBS) network
Before a burst is transmitted, the edge router generates a control and sends it to the destination to set up a lightpath for this burst. As the control packet travels toward the destination, each optical burst switch along the light reads the burst size and arrival time from the control packet. Then in advance of the burst arrival, the burst switch schedules an appropriate time period on a wavelength that the next lighpath segment eill use to carry the burst this reservation for the arriving burst is called burst scheduling.