• Framing is the process of encapsulating the packets received from network layer into frames.
• The complete message from the network layer can be packed into single frame but this is not done as flow and error control becomes inefficient as even a single bit error would require the retransmission of whole message.
• Each frame is added with a header which defines the address(mac address) of the sender and receiver which helps in segregating the message from one source to destination or other message to other destination.
• The frames can be of variable size or of fixed size.
• Ethernet frame is of variable size whereas ATM frame is of fixed size.

Ethernet Frame:

• Data from the network layer is encapsulated in a frame.

Categories: Networking