[BEE-3] Glossary
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Common terms used across BEE documents.
Authentication & Security
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Authentication (AuthN) | Verifying the identity of a user or system |
| Authorization (AuthZ) | Determining what an authenticated entity is allowed to do |
| JWT | JSON Web Token -- a compact, self-contained token for transmitting claims |
| OAuth 2.0 | An authorization framework for delegated access |
| RBAC | Role-Based Access Control -- permissions assigned to roles, roles assigned to users |
| ABAC | Attribute-Based Access Control -- permissions based on attributes of user, resource, and environment |
Networking & API
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| REST | Representational State Transfer -- an architectural style for networked applications |
| gRPC | A high-performance RPC framework using Protocol Buffers |
| Idempotency | The property that an operation produces the same result regardless of how many times it is applied |
| Load Balancer | A component that distributes incoming requests across multiple backend servers |
| Reverse Proxy | A server that forwards client requests to backend servers |
Architecture
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Microservices | An architecture where an application is composed of small, independently deployable services |
| Monolith | An architecture where the entire application is deployed as a single unit |
| Modular Monolith | A monolith with well-defined internal module boundaries |
| CQRS | Command Query Responsibility Segregation -- separate models for reads and writes |
| DDD | Domain-Driven Design -- modeling software around the business domain |
| Bounded Context | A DDD concept defining the boundary within which a particular domain model applies |
Data & Storage
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| ACID | Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, Durability -- transaction properties |
| CAP Theorem | A distributed system can guarantee at most two of: Consistency, Availability, Partition tolerance |
| Eventual Consistency | A consistency model where replicas converge to the same state over time |
| Sharding | Distributing data across multiple databases based on a partition key |
| Replication | Copying data across multiple database instances |
Runtime & Reliability
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Circuit Breaker | A pattern that prevents cascading failures by stopping requests to a failing service |
| Backpressure | A mechanism for a consumer to signal a producer to slow down |
| SLO | Service Level Objective -- a target value for a service level indicator |
| Error Budget | The allowed amount of unreliability within an SLO period |
| Dead Letter Queue | A queue for messages that cannot be processed successfully |