Section 18 of 26

Architecture

Vocabulary

In prose, these are ordinary lowercase nouns:

plot, body, info, kind, gear, port, cord, fore, back, host, plan, play.

Use capitalization normally at sentence starts and for actual proper names/code identifiers such as Conduit, ConduitOS, Patchbay, BodyId, or Rust Plot.

Provenance: #4066.

Semantic paths and the fore boundary

Semantic kind paths are arbitrarily deep cladistic names, not fixed-rank category/leaf tuples.

machine/memory/mmio/read/u32
bus/pci/function/bar
audio/hda/codec/verb
math/matrix/multiply

Common prefixes may express organization/ancestry, but path depth and prefix do not establish type compatibility. Exact semantic compatibility comes from reviewed kind identity/contract and fore law.

Canonical grammar direction:

KindPath := Name ("/" Name)+

Apply ordinary identifier/source-size bounds rather than a small aesthetic depth limit.

fore is the canonical user-facing noun for the checked callable signature of a kind/plot:

Kind = semantic meaning of the work
Fore = the function-like signature through which it is called
Back = one concrete realization compatible with that Fore

The fore is not merely an internal compiler boundary. It is the callable surface presented to authors. For an authored plot, the parenthesized declaration is its fore; catalog kinds expose the same concept.

A checked fore includes the public calling facts that participate in functional compatibility:

startup parameters
  names, order, value types, required/default shape

runtime ports
  names, directions, value types, temporal shapes

declared shorthand
  input -> output path, where present

fore need not be a literal source keyword for the concept to be user-facing: the signature itself is the fore.

face is unrelated to fore. face belongs to the separate human-interaction/presentation architecture; it is not a renamed callable boundary and should not be taught as part of this vocabulary lineage.

Shared fore shape alone does not make different kinds semantically substitutable. Equal fores mean they can be called the same way; semantic contract identity says whether they mean the same work.

Provenance: #3998, #4037.

Architectural altitude and superseded vocabulary

Keep each noun at one altitude:

Kind      semantic contract: what something means
Fore      user-visible checked callable signature of a Kind/Plot
Back      one concrete realization compatible with that Kind/Fore
Gear      one configured occurrence/invocation of a Kind in a Plot
Port      typed directional point named by a Fore and used by a Gear
Cord      semantic connection between compatible Ports
info      general typed/structured value carried through Cords
data      independently addressable content generation (section 6A), not the generic payload noun
Base      concrete mechanism/resource boundary beneath a Host
Line      finite connectivity realization
Sign      bounded evidence/observation about what is true or what happened
Host      truthful finite current realization offers for one Boot
Plan      exact immutable selected realization
Play      active execution of one exact Plan
Step      one bounded kernel transition while advancing a Play
Host Call one bounded request an executing Back makes across the Host boundary
Body      durable continuant
Face      Body's human-facing semantic encounter and control grammar
Mask      planned user-agent realization of a Face
Show      one finite realized occurrence through a Mask

Compact execution sentence:

A gear invokes a kind through its fore. A host offers a back for that kind. A plan chooses the back. A play advances it in steps. A step may make a host Call.

Compact flow sentence:

gears exchange info through cords; lines may realize cross-host carriage; signs tell planning/execution what the realized world establishes.

Lifecycle action vocabulary uses birth for the explicit authorized action that creates a body. A birth event/sign is evidence of that transition. birth creates the continuant; it does not implicitly Wake, plan or play. WAKE and LULL remain body lifecycle concepts distinct from boot and play.

Supersession map

Historical tickets may contain earlier nouns. Current meaning is:

generic architectural Data     -> info
old/internal callable Front    -> fore (user-visible callable signature)
Body human-facing semantic surface -> face (separate presentation concept; unrelated to fore)
Presenter                      -> mask
presentation Manifestation     -> show
HostOperation                  -> host call
BE BORN / BORN action label    -> birth

This is semantic migration, not blind text replacement. Historical evidence keeps the words it actually recorded.

The reintroduced current noun data is intentionally narrower than the retired generic Data noun: data now means independently addressable content under section 6A.

Do not use Capability as a generic synonym for implementation/offer. Capability retains possession/authority meaning where appropriate.

Provenance: #610, #615, #644, #1281, #3831, #3862, #3863, #3865, #4037, #3951.