Timelines, providers, completeness, and the feeder
A document can combine provider-backed histories from MyOS, banks, governments, KYA providers, services, and blockchains—then process them only after the relevant window is complete.
A Timeline is one provider-backed perspective#
A Timeline is an append-only, tamper-evident history maintained under a provider's rules. It may represent a person, business account, service, agent, device, document session, or another stable context.
It is not a global ledger and does not claim to contain every fact in the world.
The Timeline Entry envelope#
A current conceptual entry contains the Timeline identity, predecessor reference, provider-assigned microsecond timestamp, attributed actor, optional source, optional Mandate Authority, and the business Message.
The message does not get to self-assert trusted actor, source, or timestamp.
One entry per microsecond within one Timeline#
The v1.3 Timeline architecture assigns at most one entry to a given microsecond within a Timeline. Timestamps are therefore unique and strictly increasing inside that Timeline; no separate sequence field is required.
Independent Timelines can use the same timestamp. The feeder then applies a fixed deterministic tie-breaker based on stable Timeline and exact entry identity. Network arrival order is never semantic.
A document can use many providers#
Each Timeline Channel binds a Timeline and actor to a role. One Root may contain a customer channel from MyOS, a merchant channel from a bank, a permit channel from a government registry, and an agent channel from a KYA provider.
The providers remain visible and non-interchangeable.
Timestamps are not enough#
Sorting known entries does not prove that the set is complete. A delayed earlier entry from another provider could change the order and result.
A provider therefore closes a frontier at time T with a binding promise: every entry before T has been revealed, and no future accepted entry will receive a timestamp before T.
The feeder obtains a frontier from every relevant Timeline. The slowest one defines the common safe boundary.
The feeder closes the outside world#
For each active Root, the feeder discovers external channels, fetches entries and provider evidence, closes a complete window, orders entries deterministically, derives source channels, evaluates direct or Mandate-backed eligibility, checks exact-state constraints, and supplies one original eligible entry to the processor.
It also distinguishes:
- eligible — evidence resolves and permits delivery;
- ineligible / withheld — evidence resolves and proves the action is not allowed;
- deferred — required completeness, Mandate state, content, or provider proof is temporarily unavailable.
Checkpoints and replay#
The source channel records a checkpoint only after successful commit. Redelivery after commit is stale. Retry after an uncommitted failure runs against the unchanged Root.
Given the same complete eligible input history and runtime profile, processing is replayable.