1.3 Terminology
Terms from the policy language — rule, fact, verdict, backstop, priority, exception — mean what the network policy reference says. The terms below are netd's own.
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| interface | A kernel network link netd has seen, keyed by its kernel index while it exists and named in the registry by its interface id. |
| interface id | A UUID-shaped digest of an interface's bus path and MAC (§4.1). Stable across boots and kernel renames. |
| verdict | What the interface layer said about an interface: JOIN(profile), IGNORE or DOWN. |
| joined (managed) | An interface whose verdict is JOIN. Loopback is never joined. Only joined interfaces get clients, contribute readiness, and appear in DNS snapshots. |
| profile | A resolved key under Profiles\, inheritance applied: how a joined interface stands on its network. |
| generation | One build of the interface layer and the profiles from one reading of the registry. netd holds the last good generation; a refused one changes nothing. |
| pass | One run of netd's converge sequence (§2.2): identify networks, judge links, start or stop clients, reconcile, publish. |
| desired state | What one interface should look like: up or down, its MTU, its addresses and its routes (§4.2). |
| reconcile | Diffing desired state against the kernel's and applying the difference (§4.3). |
| network | What is on the other side of a joined interface's carrier, identified from what it has offered (§7.1) and recorded under Networks\<id>. |
| offer | Everything a network has said: a DHCPv4 lease, router advertisements, a stateless DHCPv6 reply. |
| level | How far an interface has got towards being usable: absent, link, addressed or routed (§8.2). |
| scope | What one interface contributes to name resolution, as sent to resolvd (§8.3). |