Field of the Invention
The present description relates to identification tags and a unique application method for applying said tags in high density applications. More specifically, the description relates to identification tags that have a two dimensional unique identifier code disposed on a portion thereof.
Background
Within modern data centers and telecommunication facilities, tens if not hundreds of thousands of electrical or fiber-optic patching connections are made. Data centers and communications installations typically have many patch bays comprising communication racks containing patch panels where pieces of communications equipment residing in other racks are interconnected. For instance, Ethernet switches are typically connected to dozens of servers located in various racks within a data center and these connections are made on either optical or copper wire based patch panels.
After initial equipment installation, data centers may move, add, and change (MAC) the location of pieces of equipment when new equipment is added or existing equipment is replaced or upgraded. These changes are referred to as MAC events. When a MAC event occurs, personnel will manually move one or more patch cords in the patch bays. Each manual movement of a patch cord carries the potential risks that the wrong patch cable will be moved or that the cable records will be modified with incorrect change information that could jeopardize both future MAC events as well as current communication. In addition, patch cables are sometimes abandoned in place for fear of disturbing other connections.
Providing positive identification of individual patch cables and interconnections can help eliminate these problems. However, the tagging of connections can be troublesome in high density connection environments such as those found in data centers and communication installations. Because of the pure magnitude of connections in these environments, properly tagging each of these connections is an immense job, especially in situations where there is an existing population of unidentified connections tagged. Current tagging approaches typically involve manually tagging a single connection with that connection's relevant information. This process is both labor-intensive and potentially subject to tagging errors.
In addition, current labels for patch cables and ports in a patch panel can be relatively large. In areas with high connection densities, the size of the tags can become cumbersome. A second problem with the current labeling concepts is that the tags are often rigidly fixed to some portion of the patch cords which can lead to issues in reading the tags after installation and can require positioning of the reader relative to the tag to conform to the tag orientation, or some portion of the patch cord must be positioned to conform to the reader orientation. When the tags are rigidly attached to the patch cords, the need to get the correct orientation between the reader and the tag ranges from being a minor impediment to causing a disruption of service in order to read the tag on the patch cord.
Thus, what is needed is a smaller easier to read tag for use in dense environments that can be installed in a more efficient and accurate manner in data centers and communication installations having existing untagged patch cables and ports.