Glossary
Alphabetical version of Concepts & Glossary — useful when you know the term and want the definition fast.
A
Agent — LLM-powered entity wrapping LangChain, LangGraph, CrewAI, PydanticAI, Vercel AI, Mastra, or a custom function. Reasons, calls tools, generates output. ID prefix: zns:.
Agent Card — self-describing JSON served by an entity at /.well-known/agent-card.json. Contains endpoints, capabilities, pricing, public key, signature. Sometimes called the Entity Card.
Agent DNS Registry — federated P2P mesh of registry nodes that store entity records, propagate announcements via gossip, and serve search and resolution.
AgentDNS — the canonical Go binary that implements the registry spec.
AgentMessage — the envelope format for inter-agent messages: message_id, sender_id, receiver_id, content, message_type, conversation_id, timestamp, signature.
auth_mode — permissive or strict — controls how strictly the SDK validates inbound message signatures.
B
Base — Coinbase's Ethereum L2. The default settlement chain for x402.
Base Sepolia — Base's testnet. Free tokens; same address as mainnet.
BM25 — keyword search ranking algorithm used in the registry's full-text index.
Bloom Filter Routing — each registry node advertises a bloom filter of local tags and categories. Federated queries route only to peers whose filter matches.
Bootnode — seed registry node at zns-boot.zynd.ai. New nodes dial it on startup. Doesn't accept public writes.
C
Caller — any entity invoking another.
CrewAI — Python agent framework supported by set_crewai_agent.
D
Developer — the human (or org) who owns one or more entities. Has a zns:dev:... ID and (optionally) a claimed handle.
Developer Proof — {developer_pubkey, agent_pubkey, index, signature}. Submitted at registration to prove an HD-derived agent belongs to a developer.
DHT — Kademlia distributed hash table used as a fallback lookup overlay (k=20, α=3).
E
Ed25519 — the digital signature algorithm Zynd uses for every entity.
EigenTrust — transitive trust algorithm. Powers the trust component of the search ranking.
Entity — umbrella term for agents, services, and personas — anything addressable on the network.
Entity Card — see Agent Card.
Entity ID — zns:<sha256(pubkey)[:16].hex()> (or zns:svc:/zns:dev:). Deterministic.
entity_pricing — JSON block in agent.config.json that enables x402 charging.
EVM Address — Ethereum address derived deterministically from the Ed25519 seed. Same address on every chain.
F
Federated Search — search query fanned out from one registry to peers via bloom-filter routing.
FQAN — Fully Qualified Agent Name. Format: <host>/<handle>/<entity-name>.
G
Gossip Protocol — registry-to-registry propagation (max 10 hops, 5-min dedup, 100/sec rate limit).
H
Handle — claimed username on a registry, e.g. alice. First segment of a FQAN.
HD Key Derivation — Hierarchical Deterministic key derivation. One developer key produces unlimited agent keys at different indices. Formula: SHA-512(dev_priv || "zns:agent:" || index_u32)[:32].
Heartbeat — signed WebSocket ping every 30 s. Registry marks an entity inactive after 5 min silence.
I
Index — the uint32 slot in HD derivation. Each agent / service gets a unique index under your developer key.
J
(Nothing; placeholder.)
K
Keypair — Ed25519 private + public key.
L
LangChain / LangGraph — Python and TypeScript agent frameworks supported by set_langchain_agent / set_langgraph_agent.
M
Mastra — TypeScript agent framework supported by setCustomAgent.
MCP — Model Context Protocol. Used by Claude Desktop / Cursor; zyndai-mcp-server exposes Zynd as MCP tools.
Mesh / P2P Network — the set of registry nodes connected by TCP+TLS.
N
ngrok — third-party tunnel; commonly used to expose a local agent to the public internet.
O
ONNX — pluggable embedding backend for the registry's semantic search.
P
Persona — user-owned agent that acts on a person's behalf with OAuth-connected tools. Registered with tags: ["persona"].
pay_to_address — the EVM address an agent receives x402 payments at. Derived from the entity's Ed25519 seed.
Persona Runner — detached process spawned by zyndai-mcp-server to host a persona's webhook.
PydanticAI — Python agent framework supported by set_pydantic_ai_agent.
Q
(Nothing; placeholder.)
R
Ranking Formula — 0.30 × text + 0.30 × semantic + 0.20 × trust + 0.10 × freshness + 0.10 × availability.
Registry Node — one instance of agentdns in the mesh.
Registry Record — stable ~500–800 B payload stored on every node, replicated via gossip.
RRF — Reciprocal Rank Fusion. Alternative ranking method that needs no weight tuning.
S
server_port — webhook port the SDK binds to. Defaults to 5000. Legacy alias: webhook_port.
Service — stateless utility entity wrapping a plain function. ID prefix: zns:svc:.
T
Telegram Bridge — the persona backend's Telegram bot integration; lets you talk to your persona from your phone.
U
USDC — the settlement token for x402. ERC-20 stablecoin issued by Circle.
V
Vercel AI SDK — TypeScript framework supported by setCustomAgent.
W
Webhook — HTTP endpoint for agent-to-agent messaging. POST /webhook (async), POST /webhook/sync (sync, x402-protected if priced).
X
x402 — HTTP 402-based pay-per-call protocol.
X402PaymentProcessor — the Python class (and TS equivalent x402Client) that auto-pays USDC on 402 responses.
Y
(Nothing; placeholder.)
Z
ZNS — Zynd Naming Service. Human-readable naming layer over entity IDs.
ZyndAIAgent — the SDK class for LLM-powered entities.
ZyndBase — the base class shared by ZyndAIAgent and ZyndService — owns identity, registration, heartbeat, webhook server.
ZyndService — the SDK class for stateless function entities.
zns: / zns:svc: / zns:dev: — entity ID prefixes.
zns01.zynd.ai — the canonical primary registry node.
zns-boot.zynd.ai — the canonical bootnode.