Glossary
Short definitions of the terms used across Lahijan and its documentation.
Terms are listed alphabetically. Names in code are the exact identifiers used in the API or configuration.
.lahx package
The file format for distributing a plugin. A .lahx file is a ZIP archive with two entries: the manifest lahijan.manifest.yaml and the compiled WebAssembly module plugin.wasm. Build and check one with the lahx tool; see Command line and Packaging (.lahx).
Access key
A pair of S3 credentials (an access key id and a secret key) that lets an S3 client read or write one bucket directly. In the dashboard it is called a credential and is created with Mint credential. Each access key is scoped to a single bucket, can be limited to certain actions (Read, Write, List, Tagging, Admin) and can have an expiry. The secret is shown only once. See Access keys.
Access token
Agent
The chat assistant on the Agent page. It turns plain-language requests into actions on Lahijan, using a model provider key you add under Settings > AI Provider. The tenant's agent policy limits what it may do, and it can ask you to approve an action before running it. See Agent.
Agent policy
Per-tenant rules for the agent: which models may be used, rate and spending limits, and which tools it may not call. Managed under Administration > Agent Policy. See Agent policy.
Audit event
One entry in the audit log: who did what to which resource, when, and with what result. Lahijan records the event before it acts and appends the outcome afterwards, so its status is pending, success or failure. Audit events cannot be changed or deleted. See Audit log.
Backup
A full export of an instance, stored outside the compute host on a backup target (an S3, NFS or SSH destination). Unlike a snapshot, a backup survives the loss of the host. See Snapshots and backups.
Balance
The prepaid amount of money a user has available. Top-ups and refunds increase it; metered usage is charged against it. The balance belongs to a user, not to a tenant. Amounts are stored in whole cents. See Balance and usage.
Bootstrap admin
The first account on a new deployment, created automatically on the first start against an empty database from the bootstrap.* settings. It holds the platform administrator role. See Install on a server.
Bucket
A container for objects in object storage, reached with any S3-compatible client. A bucket is created in a tenant and identified by its slug (lowercase letters, digits and dashes). Bucket names are unique across the platform. See Buckets.
Console
Interactive access to a running instance from the browser: a text terminal for any instance, and a graphical console for virtual machines. See Console and exec.
Container
An instance type that shares the host's kernel. A system container behaves like a lightweight Linux machine (with its own init system, users and services) and starts in seconds. Compare virtual machine.
DNSSEC
DNS Security Extensions: cryptographic signatures on a zone's records that let resolvers check the answers are genuine. You turn it on per zone, then publish the resulting DS record at your registrar. See DNSSEC.
Domain
A domain name you register, renew or transfer through Lahijan, when the operator has connected a domain registrar. Registering a domain is separate from hosting its zone. See Domains.
Exec
Running a single command inside an instance and getting its output, without an interactive session. See Console and exec.
Floating IP
A public IP address allocated to a tenant from an operator-managed IP pool, which you can attach to an instance and later move to another. It stays allocated to the tenant until you release it. See Floating IPs.
Image
The starting file system an instance is created from, such as ubuntu/24.04. Images come from the remote image catalog, and you can add custom images to your tenant's catalog. See Images.
Instance
A compute unit: either a system container or a virtual machine. You create it from an image with a size (vCPUs, memory, disk) and start, stop, restart and delete it as you need. See Instances.
Ledger
The append-only record of every change to a user's balance: charges, top-ups and refunds. Entries are never edited or deleted; a correction is a new entry. See Balance and usage.
Linked identity
An external sign-in account (for example from an OAuth, OIDC or SAML provider) connected to your Lahijan account, so you can sign in with it. Managed under Settings > Identities. See Linked identities.
Manifest
The file lahijan.manifest.yaml inside every .lahx package. It declares the plugin's name, version, the permission scopes it requests, its configuration schema and its entry points. See Manifest reference.
Marketplace
A catalog of plugins that a platform administrator can browse and install from, under Administration > Marketplace. See Plugin marketplace.
Membership
The link between a user and a tenant, carrying the user's role in that tenant. A user can have memberships in several tenants.
Metering
Measuring the resources each user runs, once a minute. Metered usage is priced with the price catalog and charged to the user's balance. See Balance and usage.
Network
A virtual network that connects instances to each other and to the outside world. See Networks.
Permission
A named right to perform one action, written as dotted words such as compute.instance.create or audit.read. Permissions are grouped into roles. See Permissions.
Permission scope
A permission a plugin requests in its manifest, such as network.outbound:hooks.slack.com or events.listen:compute.instance.*. The part after the colon narrows the permission to one target; a trailing * matches everything under that prefix. A platform administrator approves each scope separately when installing the plugin. See Manifest reference.
Personal access token
A secret token that authenticates API requests as you, sent in the Authorization: Bearer header. Tokens start with lah_pat_. Create and revoke them under Settings > Access Tokens. See Access tokens.
Personal tenant
The tenant created automatically for a user who registers on their own, with that user as its owner. Controlled by the auth.signup.personalTenant setting (on by default).
Platform administrator
The global role platform.admin, held by the people who run the deployment. It passes every permission check in every tenant and gives access to the Administration section of the dashboard. See Roles and permissions.
Plugin
A WebAssembly program that extends a deployment, for example by reacting to events, calling external services or adding API endpoints. Plugins run in a sandbox and can only use the permission scopes an administrator approved. See How plugins work.
Pre-signed URL
A time-limited URL that lets anyone who has it download (GET) or upload (PUT) one object in a bucket without their own access key. See Pre-signed URLs.
Price catalog
The list of unit prices per resource type (for example a price per vCPU-hour) that turns metered usage into charges. Managed under Administration > Billing. See Billing administration.
Profile
A reusable set of configuration and devices (such as network interfaces, disks and resource limits) applied to instances. An instance can use one or more profiles. See Profiles.
Quota
A limit on a bucket: a maximum total size in bytes, a maximum number of objects, or both. 0 means unlimited. See Quotas.
Record
One DNS entry in a zone, such as an A record for www.example.org. or an MX record for mail. See Records.
Recovery code
A single-use code that stands in for your second factor if you lose your authenticator or passkey. Generated under Settings > Security. See Sign-in security.
Role
A named set of permissions. Every tenant has the built-in roles owner (tenant.owner), admin (tenant.admin), member (tenant.member) and viewer (tenant.viewer); there is also the global platform administrator role. See Roles and permissions.
Session
A signed-in browser. Signing in creates a session held in a cookie, renewed with a refresh token. You can see and end your sessions under Settings > Sessions. See Sessions.
Snapshot
A point-in-time copy of an instance kept on the same host, which you can restore the instance to. A snapshot policy takes snapshots on a schedule. Compare backup. See Snapshots and backups.
Storage pool
Disk space on the compute host from which instances get their root disks and extra volumes. See Storage pools.
Tenant
A workspace that owns resources: instances, zones, buckets, audit events and more. Tenants are isolated from each other; a request picks its tenant with the X-Tenant-Id header, and the dashboard with the tenant switcher. See Core concepts.
Top-up
A credit added to a user's balance. A platform administrator can top up any user by hand; if online payments are set up, users can also top up themselves. See Billing administration and Payments and plans.
TOTP
Time-based one-time password: the 6-digit codes from an authenticator app, used as a second sign-in factor. Set up under Settings > Security > Authenticator app. See Sign-in security.
Virtual machine
An instance type with its own kernel, running on hardware virtualization. It is fully isolated from the host and can run any operating system the image provides, at the cost of more memory and a slower start than a container.
WebAuthn
The web standard behind passkeys and hardware security keys, usable as a second factor under Settings > Security > Passkeys / security keys when the operator has configured it. See Sign-in security.
X-Tenant-Id
The HTTP request header that tells the API which tenant a request is for. Its value is the tenant's id (a UUID). See REST API.
Zone
The DNS data for one domain (for example example.org.) and every name under it, served authoritatively by Lahijan. Zone names are written with a trailing dot and are unique across the platform. See Zones.
Zone template
A predefined set of records you can add to a zone in one step, when you create it or later. See Zone templates.