Glossary
Autonomi Foundation
Often referred to just as the Foundation. A Swiss non-profit that facilitates, supports, funds and promotes the research and development of the Protocol, as well as enables the ongoing delivery, maintenance and adoption of the Network and its technologies. Formerly known as the Safe Network Foundation.
Autonomi Protocol
Often referred to just as the Protocol. A collection of open source algorithms, libraries and components that allows computers to form an autonomous data network
Asynchronous
Not time-dependent. A system that supports asynchronicity should come to consensus no matter what order the various messages arrive in.
Boneh-Lynn-Shacham Distributed Key Generation (BLS-DKG)
A cryptographic system that authenticates the sender of a message, allows for multiple parties to quickly come to a consensus, and can enable multi-signature transactions and n-of-k credentials
Byzantine Fault Tolerance
The ability of a decentralized network to function properly even if up to a third of the nodes (plus 1) is corrupt or faulty
CashNote
Encrypted digital ‘cheque’ for a given value containing all the necessary information for the owner of the associated secret key to spend that value.
Churn
Nodes joining and leaving the Network
Chunk
An immutable data type
Client
Software that allows users to connect to the Network and make use of its services
Close Group
A Close Group is a small number of nodes that look after a specific piece of data, and that only exist as a group for that specific data. This system of close groups allows nodes to act independently, but together to form a strong autonomous global network, capable of storing and retaining data in perpetuity.
Data structures that obey certain mathematical rules which ensure that when multiple versions of data exist across a distributed network, eventually these will always converge onto one ‘true’ version
Data map
A record of content chunks and their corresponding locations on the Network. Only users in possession of the data map can recreate the file
Data payment
A one-time payment made upfront for data storage
Distributed hash table
A map of where data is stored on a distributed network
Fault detection
Detecting nodes that are acting suspiciously and removing them from the routing table.
Genesis supply
At the inception of the Network 1,288,490,189 tokens will be created. This represents 30% of the Maximum Supply
GossipSub
A libp2p publish/subscribe system whereby peers congregate around topics they are interested in by subscribing to them.
A distributed hash table (DHT) protocol which provides a way for millions of computers to self-organize into a network.
A Kademlia-based open source peer-to-peer networking framework.
MaidSafeCoin
A cryptocurrency token, created during a crowd-sale (or ICO) in April 2014, that will be exchangeable, on a 1:1 basis for Autonomi's native token once the Network is live. There are both Omni (MAID) and ERC-20 (EMAID) variants of MaidSafeCoin.
Maximum Supply
Total number of whole Autonomi's tokens created over the Network’s lifetime: 4,294,967,296
Multiaddress
A unique locator for a peer that encodes multiple networking protocols into a single address
Multimap
A mutable CRDT data type for mapping keys to multiple values.
Network royalties
A mechanism through which software development, services, and data which provide value to people that use Network, benefit wider society, and meet the objectives of the project, can be meaningfully rewarded and sustainably funded
A portion of the Genesis supply that will be allocated to a Pool and distributed as Network Royalties, in support of the Network and its aims.
A machine that connects with others using Autonomi's Protocol to form the Network.
Proof-of-Resource
A system that rewards nodes based on the quality of the service they provide, making it economically disadvantageous for them to misbehave
Proof of Work
The consensus algorithm used by the Bitcoin blockchain and others to confirm that transactions are valid and to deter attacks.
Proof of Stake
The consensus algorithm used by the Etherum blockchain and others in which voting power is proportional to wealth.
A mutable CRDT data type.
Payment to the operators of resource-providing nodes in return for storing data.
Safe Network
The former name for Autonomi
Content uploaded to the Autonomi is broken up into chunks. These chunks are then hashed, encrypted locally using the AES-256 encryption algorithm and the hashes of neighbouring chunks. Because content is encrypted and decrypted locally, there is no need for keys to leave the user’s machine.
Spend
Transaction information stored on the Network.
Stigmergy
An indirect mechanism of coordination between actors, in which the trace of an action stimulates the performance of a subsequent action.
Storage reward rate
An adjustable factor that determines the rate of pay of participating nodes; it is increased when more storage is needed, decreased when there is an excess of storage space
Token emission
3,167,866,884 tokens, representing 70% of the Maximum Supply, emitted by the Network over an extended time; 30 years or more.
Transfer
A monetary transaction on the Network.
XOR address
A unique 256-bit number; every entity on the Network has an XOR address
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