Patent ID: 7489688

Claim:
A method of generating a frame of aggregated data, the method comprising the steps of: (a) associating one or more user data frames into aggregated user data in accordance with a first layer; (b) generating, at an aggregation layer, one or more sub-frames from the aggregated user data by adding at least one header to the aggregated data, each sub-frame having a format in accordance with a second layer, wherein step (b) comprises the steps of: (b1) forming one or more sub-frames from the one or more user data frames by adding a sub-frame header in accordance with the second layer to each corresponding user data frame, (b2) grouping the one or more sub-frames with a predefined order based on a transmission characteristic, and (b3) adding a descriptor to the grouped sub-frames, wherein the descriptor is an aggregate frame descriptor comprising an aggregate frame header indicating a type of frame, a number of sub-frames, and at least one sub-frame descriptor for the sub-frames; and (c) forming an aggregated frame from the one or more sub-frames in accordance with a third layer.