Everything between the transmitter and the receiver that does not need power: the installed cables, splices, connectors, patch panels, closures and pathways. Outside plant covers the poles, ducts, vaults and buried cable; inside plant covers risers, trays and equipment rooms. Cable plant is designed, installed and tested separately from the electronics and usually outlives several generations of them.
Cable plant passed acceptance last month, so if the link won't come up it's an optics or config problem, not ours.
Also heard as
- fiber plant
Related terms
Loss budget
The calculated total loss a fiber link should have, built from fiber length, connectors and splices.
Dark fiber
Installed fiber with no transmission equipment attached, either spare or leased bare to a customer who lights it.
Splice closure
A sealed, re-enterable housing that protects fiber splices in outside plant, on poles, in vaults or buried.
Patch panel
A rack-mounted enclosure of adapters where permanent cable fibers end and jumpers connect them to equipment.