Glossary¶

Short definitions for terms used across Consist docs. For the mental model, see Core Concepts.

Term	Meaning
Artifact	A tracked file or file-like output with path, format, fingerprint, direction, and producing or consuming run metadata.
Cache hit	A run lookup result where Consist finds a prior completed run with the same signature and returns its output artifact metadata instead of executing again.
Cache miss	A run lookup result where no matching completed run exists, so Consist executes the step and records a new run.
Canonical hashing	Deterministic hashing of config, inputs, and identity metadata so equivalent values produce the same signature.
Config	Run parameters included in the signature through `config={...}`. Changing config invalidates the cache for that run.
Coupler	The scenario helper that maps named outputs from one step into named inputs for later steps.
DLT	Optional data loading integration used by Consist to ingest typed tabular data into DuckDB with provenance columns.
Derivable references	Maintenance condition where Consist can infer safe table relationships from stored keys such as `run_id` and `content_hash`.
Facet	Queryable run metadata, such as `year`, `scenario`, `stage`, or `phase`, used to find and compare runs.
Ghost mode	Recovery mode where provenance or ingested data remains queryable even when the original cold file is missing.
Hydration	Restoring artifact metadata and usable artifact objects from prior runs without necessarily copying bytes.
Config identity	The configuration component (full config dict or adapter-derived structure) that contributes to a run signature.
DuckDB ingestion	Loading artifact contents into DuckDB for SQL-native analysis and recovery.
Lineage	The dependency chain from an output artifact back through the runs, inputs, configs, and upstream artifacts that produced it.
Filesystem materialization	Ensuring bytes exist at a requested filesystem destination, either by copying historical files or exporting ingested data.
Provenance	Evidence for what produced a result: code, config, inputs, environment metadata, outputs, and status.
Recovery roots	Ordered archive or mirror roots stored on artifact metadata so future hydration can find bytes after the original workspace path moves.
Run	A single tracked execution, cache hit, or trace block with inputs, config, outputs, status, timing, and metadata.
Run-link table	A global table containing `run_id` but not `consist_run_id`; used for run-associated metadata and safe maintenance derivation.
Run-scoped table	A global table containing `consist_run_id`; rows are directly attributable to a specific run.
Scenario	A parent run that groups related child runs for a multi-step workflow, iteration, or scenario variant.
Signature	The deterministic fingerprint built from code identity, config identity, inputs, and selected execution metadata. Used for cache lookup.
Staging	Copying a canonical artifact to a requested local path for a path-bound callable or external tool.
Trace	An always-execute tracked block that records provenance without cache-skipping the block.
Unscoped cache table	A global table with neither `run_id` nor `consist_run_id`; preserved by default unless maintenance can prove safe pruning.
View	A registered SQLModel-backed query surface for analyzing runs or artifact data.
Virtualization	Querying file-backed and/or ingested artifacts through DuckDB without eagerly loading every file into memory.
Hybrid view	A SQL view that combines hot ingested data with cold file-backed data so runs can be queried together.