Glossary of Terms

A

• Abstraction Layer: A design pattern that translates diverse inputs into a standardized format. In Altius, the Interpreter acts as an abstraction layer to support multiple virtual machines (EVM, WASM, etc.) on a single engine.

• AppChain (Application-Specific Chain): A blockchain dedicated to a single application or use case. Altius provides the high-performance execution core for developers building sovereign AppChains.

C

• Commodity Hardware: Standard, off-the-shelf computing resources (such as typical AWS or GCP instances). Altius is engineered to achieve elite performance on these affordable units rather than requiring specialized, high-cost servers.

• Coordinator: The Altius module responsible for managing the transaction lifecycle, enforcing deterministic execution, and interfacing with external consensus and settlement layers.

D

• Data Availability (DA): The assurance that the data required to verify a block is accessible to all network participants. Altius ingests transaction batches from external DA layers.

• Determinism: A property of a system where a given set of inputs always produces the exact same output. Altius ensures total determinism across all nodes via the OCCDA protocol.

E

• Execution Client Replacement: A modular implementation where Altius is swapped into an existing Layer 1 or Layer 2 network to handle all computational logic, replacing the legacy, sequential client.

• Execution Layer: The functional layer of a network responsible for processing transaction logic and updating the system state.

I

• Instruction-Level Parallelism (ILP): A technical breakthrough that allows the engine to decompose transactions into granular instructions, enabling the simultaneous execution of non-conflicting code segments within the same transaction.

• Interpreter: The Altius module that functions as a universal translator, allowing bytecode from various virtual machines to be executed on the Altius parallel engine.

M

• Modular Architecture: A system design that decouples core functions, such as execution, consensus, and data availability, into specialized layers that can be optimized independently.

O

• Open Execution Network (OEN): The overarching economic framework of Altius that aligns developer incentives with network performance through the use of deterministic execution rewards.

• Optimistic Concurrent Control with Deterministic Abort (OCCDA): A proprietary conflict resolution protocol that ensures all nodes arrive at the same conflict set, allowing for targeted re-execution of specific instructions rather than entire transactions.

R

• Resolver: The intelligence module within Altius that performs dependency analysis and instruction-level conflict detection to schedule parallel tasks efficiently.

S

• Scalable State Merkle Trie (SSMT): A storage architecture that shards the network state across multiple nodes and prioritizes high-speed RAM access, eliminating the I/O bottlenecks associated with traditional disk storage.

• Static Single Assignment (SSA): A mathematical representation of code where each variable is assigned exactly once. Altius uses SSA to map data dependencies at high speed during the resolution phase.

• Sub-Second Finality: The ability of a system to confirm and permanently record a transaction in less than one second. Altius achieves finality in under 100 milliseconds.

V

• VM-Agnostic: The ability of a system to support multiple Virtual Machines (like EVM or MoveVM) without being natively tied to the specific opcode design of any single one.