Glossary
Authoritative definitions for terms used across the monorepo. When two domains use the same word for different things, the overload is called out explicitly. Each entry points at the canonical code or doc location.
Adapter (workflow engine)
Brain-owned per-provider inference integration used by workflow nodes (one
generic adapter per provider, with the model as a node input). Lives under
apps/brain/src/modules/domain/workflow/. The legacy flank JSON seed adapters
(apps/flank/seeds/adapters/) are retired. Avoid: “integration”, “plugin”.
Add-on
Chargebee one-time or recurring product attached to a Subscription on top
of the base Plan. In code as part of internal/app/services/billing/domain/
plan/price logic.
API Key (Brain)
Static shared secret authenticating service-to-service calls into brain.
Validated by apps/brain/src/modules/application/auth/strategies/api-key.strategy.ts
against the comma-separated AUTHORIZED_KEYS env var.
Audit Log (Strip)
Admin-action trail surfaced via the view:audit_logs permission in
apps/strip/internal/app/authorization/authorization.go. Storage backend
TODO(@law): identify the audit-log persistence backend and retention.
Auto-collection
Chargebee subscription setting controlling whether Chargebee charges the
default payment method automatically. Project policy is off — see
ADR.
Chargebee Customer
Chargebee-side billing identity. Not the same as a Clerk user — see
User. Linked via the user’s chargebee_customer_id. SDK wrapped in
apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/billing/chargebee/client.go.
Character
Domain entity owned by sirloin in
apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/characters/. Backing model:
apps/sirloin/internal/pkg/models/characters.go. The unit a creator
configures; each Character generates Media via Generations.
Clerk
Third-party identity provider. Issues JWT session tokens and oat_*
opaque OAuth tokens. Services verify via @clerk/backend,
@clerk/nextjs, or clerk-sdk-go/v2. See
auth-model.
Content Moderation
Policy enforcement on user-generated text and media. Currently surfaces
through the NSFW Toggle, round face/embedding pipelines, and Hive
moderation invoked from
apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/characters/verifyreferencedatasetimage.go
(maps Hive tags to CHARACTER_DATASET_IMAGE_FAILURE_REASON_MODERATION_FLAGGED).
Brain stores per-image outcomes in ImageModerationResult /
ImageModerationTag (apps/brain/prisma/schema.prisma). There is no
single dedicated moderation service.
Credits
Per-user, plan-derived consumption budget for Generations. Allocated by
the Chargebee event poller after invoice payment. See
apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/billing/events/poller.go.
Customer (Chargebee)
See Chargebee Customer. Customer (Chargebee) ≠ User (auth).
Deferred Activation
Pattern where Chargebee Subscriptions are created in future status and
moved to active only after the first payment is confirmed. See
ADR.
Distributed Lock
DB-backed advisory lock used to serialize payment recording across sirloin replicas. See ADR.
Embedding
Vector representation of an image produced by round’s ONNX inference.
Proto: proto/round/v1/round.proto (RoundService). Consumed by sirloin
for similarity / dataset workflows.
Event Poller (billing)
Component in apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/billing/events/poller.go
that pulls Chargebee events on a 15-second cadence. See Webhook vs
Polling.
Execution (workflow engine)
A single run of a Workflow, with a per-node trace (status, timing, inputs,
outputs, errors). Owned and stored by brain’s workflow engine
(apps/brain/src/modules/domain/workflow/). The legacy sirloin-backed
FlankStorageService execution store is removed.
Face Detection
Round inference operation that locates faces in an image. Used by sirloin
during character probe scoring. Proto: proto/round/v1/round.proto.
Failed Operation
Persisted retry record for transient backend failures. Backed by
apps/sirloin/internal/pkg/models/failedoperation.go. Worker drains them
on a schedule.
Foxy360
Internal MCP-style data gateway hosted in
apps/sirloin/internal/app/foxy360/. Aggregates data sources (Axiom,
PostHog, Chargebee, Primer, Intercom) for assistant tools.
Gateway (Primer)
Payment processor abstraction provided by Primer; collects card details
and returns a transactionId used as the idempotency key for sirloin
payment recording. See ADR.
Generation
A single inference job that produces Media (image or video). Tracked in
apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/media/ and
apps/sirloin/internal/pkg/models/media.go. Avoid: “render”, “job”
when you mean a Generation.
Item Price (Chargebee)
Chargebee price object representing one billable variant of a Plan or
Add-on. Indexed in sirloin via the chargebee_data_lookup flow.
ML Model
Versioned ONNX artifact served by round. Three model families ship today:
embeddings (apps/round/internal/pkg/models/embeddings/model.go), face
detection (apps/round/internal/pkg/models/facedetect/model.go), and face
embeddings (apps/round/internal/pkg/models/faceembedding/model.go).
Cached on disk under ModelCacheDir (apps/round/cmd/app/main.go:35).
Media
Output asset of a Generation — image or video — stored in S3-compatible
object storage. Model: apps/sirloin/internal/pkg/models/media.go.
NSFW Toggle
Per-user preference gating delivery of non-safe-for-work Media. Behavior specified in ADR.
Plan
Chargebee recurring product the Subscription is attached to. Compare
Add-on. Modelled in apps/sirloin/internal/app/services/billing/domain/.
Probe
Diagnostic record asserting a property of a domain object — e.g.
monitor_probe for character/media QA scoring. Model:
apps/sirloin/internal/pkg/models/monitor_probe.go.
Queue
BullMQ queue (brain) or sirloin worker queue, used to dispatch background jobs. Brain dashboard: Bull Board. See brain AGENTS.md.
Saga
Multi-step payment workflow that coordinates Chargebee state and the local DB with eventual consistency. See ADR.
Subscription
Chargebee subscription record linking a Customer to a Plan plus Add-ons. Treated as authoritative state; the local DB caches it (see billing invariants).
Trigger (workflow engine)
The first node of a Workflow graph; defines the input schema and how the
workflow is invoked. Owned by brain’s workflow engine
(apps/brain/src/modules/domain/workflow/).
User
Identity backed by Clerk. Distinct from Chargebee Customer. Local
mirror in apps/sirloin/internal/pkg/models/users.go.
Webhook vs Polling
Chargebee events are consumed via polling (15s) as the primary path, with
webhooks (/webhooks/chargebee/events) as a fallback. Rationale:
ADR. Primer
disputes use webhooks (/webhooks/primer/disputes) with HMAC signatures.
Worker
Long-running goroutine in apps/sirloin/internal/app/worker/ (sirloin)
or BullMQ processor in brain that drains background tasks (renewal
retries, throttle checks, dataset descriptions, etc.).
Workflow (workflow engine)
Directed acyclic graph of nodes connected by edges, stored and executed by
brain’s workflow engine (apps/brain/src/modules/domain/workflow/) and
authored in the flank editor.
How to add a term
- Search the codebase to confirm the term is actually in use; cite at least one file path.
- Add the entry alphabetically with a 1–2 sentence definition, the code
location, and an
Avoid:line for synonyms. - If the term is overloaded across domains (e.g. Customer), state the distinction inline.
- Do not invent terms here. The glossary catalogues language already present in code or ADRs.