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Versiav0.7.0

Glossary

Terms used across this specification.

  • Collection: A paginated group of entities, such as a user’s subscribers.
  • Delegate: The user that performs actions shown under another user’s name.
  • Delegator: The user that a delegate’s actions are shown as.
  • Domain: The hostname of an instance, used to identify it in the network.
  • Domain handle: A domain that a user is shown by, such as @joe.example, proven by a DNS record or a file on the domain that names the user.
  • Entity: A JSON object with a type and a created_at, such as a User or a Subscribe.
  • Extension: An optional, namespaced addition to the core protocol.
  • Federation: The process of exchanging data between two or more instances.
  • Implementation: A software application that implements the Versia Protocol. Mastodon is an implementation of ActivityPub.
  • Inbox: The endpoint that receives messages for all of an instance’s users.
  • Instance: An application deploying an implementation. mastodon.social is an instance of Mastodon. It is described by its InstanceMetadata.
  • Interaction type: A kind of interaction with a Note that can be controlled, such as pub.versia:social/reply.
  • Media: A file, such as an image, with its media type and metadata.
  • Receiver: The instance a message is sent to.
  • Reference: A string of the form domain:id, which points to an entity.
  • Reference Collection: A Collection of references, used to list entities from other instances.
  • RichText: Formatted text, as one HTML string with a fixed set of elements.
  • Requirement: An extension that another extension builds on. An instance that lists an extension also lists the extensions it requires.
  • Sender: The instance that sends a message.
  • Structure: A JSON object that does not meet the definition of an entity, such as a Media.
  • Subscriber: A user subscribed to an entity, such as another user.
  • Subscription: The link between a subscriber and the entity they are subscribed to, started with a Subscribe and ended with an Unsubscribe.
  • Transient Entity: An entity with no id, which cannot be fetched or referenced.
  • User address: A shorthand for a user, in the form @username@instance.