New simulation techniques for evaluating telecommunications transmission systems with forward error control

We first describe the conventional Monte-Carlo simulation technique, which provide the basis for the techniques devised. Before presenting the details of the new techniques we discuss the primary distinction between our approach and related work, the widely known simulation acceleration technique of importance sampling. We then concentrate on a new technique which is generally applicable to both block codes and convolutional codes. We explain the concept, present the mathematical foundation, formulate the implementation, and discuss the verification aspects of the technique. We then present a further improvement over this new technique when we are concerned with only block codes. Finally, we present examples of using these new techniques to simulate the system error performance at the critical low error rate region of system operation. The resulting three algorithms have proved to be useful tools in evaluating the performance of prospective coding schemes for optically amplified trans-oceanic transmission systems. Whilst a white noise channel has been considered in detail, the approach taken has the potential to be extended to correlated noise environments