a system and method of selecting and viewing communication traffic transmitted over an optical channel selected from among a plurality of possible channels without disrupting the communication traffic occurring over the selected channel or other channels is presented . the system and method includes an optical channel analyzing switch which taps each of the possible plurality of channels and selects a specific channel for routing to a network analyzer . the signal on the selected channel , prior to being analyzed by the network analyzer , undergoes clock and data recovery and retiming / recombination to mitigate contamination from routing and switching the selected original signal between the signal source and the network analyzer . the retimed and recombined channel signal results in a signal , as presented to the network analyzer , which is representative of the original channel signal .