encapsulation (redirected from encapsulate)

(1) In object technology, the creation of self-contained modules that contain both the data and the processing. See object-oriented programming.

(2) The transmission of one network protocol within another. As data moves down the protocol stack from the application layer to the data link layer, each protocol encapsulates the higher level by adding its own header to the block of data passed to it. See tunneling and wrapper.

Encapsulating Protocols

In this TCP/IP example, the transport layer encapsulates the data by attaching a TCP or UDP header to the packets. The network layer encapsulates the TCP packet by adding its header and so on.

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1.		encapsulation - The technique used by layered protocols in which a layer adds header information to the protocol data unit (PDU) from the layer above. As an example, in Internet terminology, a packet would contain a header from the physical layer, followed by a header from the network layer (IP), followed by a header from the transport layer (TCP), followed by the application protocol data.
2.		encapsulation - The ability to provide users with a well-defined interface to a set of functions in a way which hides their internal workings. In object-oriented programming, the technique of keeping together data structures and the methods (procedures) which act on them.