Glossary

Entries are listed alphabetically.

Term	Definition
Adapter Cell	Bridges hardware or device protocols into Commands and Events. Adapter Cells are bound to Nodes with the required physical access.
Agent Cell	Implements application-specific behavior on top of Assets and Adapters. Agent Cells observe, decide, and act, and are typically relocatable.
Application	A named group of Cells deployed and torn down together, declared in an app spec file.
Asset Cell	Represents a physical or abstract asset and owns its canonical state. Asset Cells are logical and typically relocatable.
Bridge Cell	Connects the swarm to external systems such as HTTP or MQTT. Bridge Cells are typically deployment-bound to specific network endpoints.
Capability	A function or resource a Node provides - hardware access, a network endpoint, a platform service. Cells are placed on Nodes that carry the Capabilities and tags they need.
Cell	A message-driven, stateful Wasm module that exposes command and event handlers, owns its private persistent state, and is loaded dynamically onto an execution runtime in response to a load request. The smallest unit of compute, state, and identity in Myrmic.
Cell Class	A blueprint associated with a Wasm binary used to instantiate multiple Cells.
Cell Collective	A group of Asset Cells that behaves as a higher-level entity. There is no dedicated Collective type; it is modeled by parent Asset Cells and their Commands and Events.
Cell Handler	A function in a Cell that runs in response to something: an initialization, a Command, an Event, or a timer. A Handler runs to completion and commits its work as one unit.
Cell Instance	A running instance created from a Cell Class with its own SRI and state.
Command	A directed message that asks a specific Cell to perform an operation or change state. Commands express intent and may be rejected.
Command Response	A reply to a Command that carries a result, failure, or acknowledgement.
Data Layer	The shared persistence layer that stores per-Cell state in private scopes and provides transactional durability. It also backs the Cell Mailbox.
Event	A message that represents a fact that already happened and can be observed by multiple Cells.
Fuel metering	A compute budget mechanism that limits how many Wasm instructions a module can execute before yielding.
Host interface	The set of named import modules that the platform exposes to Wasm modules at the sandbox boundary.
Mailbox	The per-Cell queue that holds inbound Commands and Events until the Cell consumes them.
Message	The unit of communication between Cells. Message types include Commands, Events, and Command Responses.
Node	A device or operating-system process running Myrmic. It executes Cells, manages their mailboxes, and provides access to Capabilities and persistence.
Self-Organization Layer (SOL)	The decentralized control plane responsible for discovery, placement, routing, health, and failover across Nodes.
SRI	Stable Resource Identifier. The logical identity used to address a Cell regardless of placement, derived deterministically from its SRN.
SRN	Stable Resource Name. The readable, stable name given to a Cell, such as application/worker, from which its SRI is derived.
State	The private, persistent data a Cell owns, stored in its own scope in the Data Layer and durable across a restart of the Cell's process.
Swarm	The set of Myrmic Nodes that can reach each other on the network. Nodes join it by discovery, with no explicit join step; names are shared across it.
zenoh-nano	A custom no_std Rust implementation of the Zenoh protocol for embedded devices.