because the leading data packet 402 is not successfully received in this case the acknowledgement packet indicates the leading sequence number as u201c 4 u201d and the ending sequence number as u201c 3 u201d leading sequence number u2014 1 to indicate that there is no contiguous block of successfully received data packets beginning with the leading data packet the streamlined burst acknowledgement information illustrated in fig6 lessens the burden on a receiver responsible for generating and sending an acknowledgement packet in response to a burst of data packets unlike previously implemented acknowledgement packets the acknowledgement packet shown in fig6 needs not keep track of the successful or unsuccessful reception of every data packet sent in succession from the transmitter such as by inclusion of a bit map containing bits that provide a one to one correspondence to all such data packets in accordance with the present embodiment of the invention an acknowledgement packet may simply identify the beginning and end of a contiguous block of successfully received packets thereby reducing the amount of processing the receiver must perform within a specified time limit fig7 is a flowchart outlining illustrative steps performed at a receiver for processing received data packets and processing received acknowledgement request packets in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention specifically a sub flowchart 700 provides steps for processing a received data packet while a separate sub flowchart 750 provides steps for processing a received acknowledgement request packet according to the present embodiment of the invention the receiver maintains a data structure referred to here as a u201c burst ack state u201d containing the following fields the burst ack state is initially reset in the present embodiment of the invention this involves setting each field in the burst ack.