Connectionless Mode Transmission
- In packet data transmission, a mode of operation in which each packet is encoded with a header containing a destination address sufficient to permit the independent delivery of the packet without the aid of additional instructions. Note: A connectionless packet is frequently called a datagram. A connectionless service is inherently unreliable in the sense that the service provider usually cannot provide assurance against the loss, error insertion, misdelivery, duplication, or out-of-sequence delivery of a connectionless packet. However, it may be possible to protect against these anomalies by providing a reliable transmission service at a higher protocol layer, e. g. , Transport Layer. See also datagram, Open Systems Interconnection--Reference Model, packet switching.
