Glossary

Terms are listed alphabetically. Console labels appear in bold.

Access token. A short-lived bearer token (15 minutes by default) returned by sign-in, sent as Authorization: Bearer <token>. Exchange the refresh token for a new pair when it expires. See Sessions.

Agent. A principal in an app with an AI model behind it. Its tools are derived from the policies on its roles. See Agents & AI.

API key. A credential bound to exactly one agent, created under App access › API keys. It authenticates the agent REST API and MCP, and can require a person's approval even where the agent would auto-approve. Keys start with plak_. See API keys.

App. One isolated database with its own users, tables, roles, policies, handlers, storage and agents. Addressed by its App ID, a uid, at the start of every app-plane path.

App organization. An organization inside your app: your product's own tenant. Every app user belongs to one or more; rows in an org-scoped table belong to one. See Organizations.

App plane. An app's own database and the API your application calls, under /{appUid}/…. Compare platform plane.

App user. An end user of your product, who signs up and signs in to your app. Not a console account.

Approval. A person's decision on a paused step. A step can be approved (it runs) or rejected (it does not, and the agent is told why). See Approvals.

autocrud. The path segment of the table API: /{appUid}/autocrud/{table}. Every table gets list, read, create, update and delete there. See Database.

Capability. A named bundle of actions, such as an SDK capability (sdk:read, sdk:query) that a handler needs, or a feature a policy can grant as a whole.

Condition. A rule on a grant that the server evaluates on each call: row ownership, an amount ceiling, an argument's allowed values. See Access control.

Console. The web interface where you and your team build and operate apps.

Custom action. An endpoint you add to a table beyond the five generated operations, usually backed by a handler. See Custom actions.

Effective permissions. The console's view of everything a principal may do, computed by the same engine that enforces it.

Handler. Server-side code you write for an app. It runs on a request, on a schedule, or as an agent's tool, and reaches data through the governed SDK. See Handlers.

Halt. Another word for a pause awaiting approval. The run reports pending_approval.

id. A row's internal sequential key. It never leaves the database; the API uses uid.

Idempotency key. An Idempotency-Key header on a write that makes a retried request run at most once. See API reference.

MCP. The Model Context Protocol. Each app serves an MCP endpoint at /{appUid}/mcp for MCP clients, authenticated with an agent's API key. See MCP.

Org reach. Which of an app's organizations the owner's agents, scheduled jobs and API keys may act in. The default reaches only the owner's own records.

Organization. On the platform plane, your customer account: it owns apps, has members and holds the subscription. Inside an app, see app organization.

Placement. Where an app's database and files live. Changing the default affects new apps only; existing data stays where it was written until it is moved.

Platform plane. Your Authoric account: your organization, its members, billing, and the apps it owns. Driven through the console.

Policy. A grant of actions on resources, keyed resource:action, optionally with conditions. Anything not granted is denied.

Principal. Whoever is making a request: an app user, an agent, a scheduled job, or you in the console.

Provision. Building an app's database. A created app is not usable until it is provisioned.

Refresh token. The longer-lived token exchanged at POST /{appUid}/auth/token for a new pair. Each refresh token is single-use.

Role. A named bundle of policies, bound to principals. Roles belong to an app. Every app user holds the built-in User role.

Run. One execution of an agent on a task. It can be running, paused for approval, completed or failed.

Scheduled job. A handler run on a schedule, as its own principal with only the roles you give it. See Scheduled jobs.

Scope by org. A table setting: each row belongs to an app organization, and callers inside the app see only their own organization's rows.

SDK. The sdk.* interface a handler uses for data, storage, email and AI. See the SDK reference.

uid. The UUID that names a record outside its database: in URLs, bodies, responses, events and tool calls. A reference to another row is a <name>_uid field.

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