The book covers the area of fiber optics from an engineering perspective. Emphasis is placed on data conversion between electrical and optical domains and the way limitations in each domain affect the other domain. Techniques to improve the fidelity of this conversion (both from electrical to optical domain, and vise versa) are also covered.
The first few chapters cover the required theoretical background including fundamentals of fiber optics communication, fiber optics networks, converting the electrical data to light, light transmission in the medium of fiber as well as converting light back to electrical signal. A critical chapter is dedicated to characterization of optical signals. The following chapters use the theoretical background to address the design of fiber optic transceivers. The author emphasizes issues that fiber optic engineers should be familiar with, but are rarely discussed in books because they belong to an area which is neither purely electrical nor optical. The last few chapters cover issues such as standards (ITU, IEEE, FSAN, etc.), test and measurement methodologies, and reliability (over temperature performance, aging, failure rates, shock and vibration, etc.).
