Glossary
Key terms and concepts in capability-driven integration, context engineering, and the Naftiko ecosystem.
| Term | Definition | Category |
|---|---|---|
| A2A (Agent-to-Agent) | Google's Agent-to-Agent protocol for tool discovery and execution across distributed agent systems. | Protocols & Standards |
| API Governance | Policies and rules that ensure APIs are consistent, secure, discoverable, and compliant across teams and environments. | Governance |
| API Reusability | The practice of making existing APIs discoverable and measurable so teams reuse what exists rather than rebuilding. | Core Concepts |
| API-First Design | An approach that starts from existing APIs and defines reusable capabilities on top, so API investments power new AI and app experiences. | Core Concepts |
| Agent Orchestration | The practice of coordinating how autonomous agents discover skills, negotiate actions, and execute workflows under governance controls. | Core Concepts |
| Agent Skills | Downloadable skill folders with SKILL.md prompt integration that developer agents can consume as packaged capabilities. | Protocols & Standards |
| AsyncAPI | A specification for describing event-driven and message-driven APIs, supported by Naftiko for consuming asynchronous integrations. | Protocols & Standards |
| Backstage | An open-source developer portal by Spotify that Naftiko integrates with for capability scaffolding, catalog registration, and governance scorecards. | Protocols & Standards |
| Capability | A governed, reusable integration unit that wraps one or more APIs into a domain-driven contract consumable by developers, copilots, and agents. | Core Concepts |
| Capability Fabric | A unified architectural layer that brings together APIs, integrations, governance, observability, and automation into a cohesive system. | Core Concepts |
| Capability Fleet | A governed layer that turns existing APIs and integrations into reusable capabilities that are discoverable, policy-driven, composable, and observable. | Core Concepts |
| Capability Spec | A declarative YAML specification validated by JSON Schema that defines consumption, orchestration, exposure, governance, and deployment for each capability. | Core Concepts |
| Context Engineering | The practice of curating fields, schemas, and descriptions so AI tool discovery is semantic and response payloads are right-sized for tasks. | Governance |
| Exposure Adapter | The protocol-specific interface a capability exposes to downstream consumers -- REST, MCP, Agent Skills, or A2A. | Core Concepts |
| Golden Path | A pre-approved, compliant-by-default pattern that teams follow to deliver capabilities without waiting for manual review. | Governance |
| Governance Rules | Blocking and advisory policies enforced at spec validation, CI merge gates, and Kubernetes admission to ensure compliance and security. | Governance |
| Identity Propagation | The practice of flowing caller identity through multi-hop agent and API chains so every action is attributable to its originator. | Governance |
| JSON Schema | A vocabulary for annotating and validating JSON documents, used by Naftiko to validate capability specs and enforce contract correctness. | Protocols & Standards |
| JSONPath Mapping | Expression-based data extraction that maps fields from upstream API responses to capability output parameters. | Core Concepts |
| MCP (Model Context Protocol) | A standard for AI copilots and agents to discover and invoke tools, resources, and prompts from external systems. | Protocols & Standards |
| MCP Server | A service that exposes tools, resources, and prompts to AI clients via the Model Context Protocol, generated automatically from a Naftiko capability spec. | Protocols & Standards |
| MCP-First Design | An approach that designs capabilities first for MCP clients, then maps them to underlying APIs for a clean AI-native integration model. | Core Concepts |
| Naftiko Framework | An open-source, Java-based Docker runtime that interprets capability specs and runs them as live services with CLI, VS Code, Backstage, and Docker Desktop extensions. | Core Concepts |
| OpenAPI | An industry-standard specification for describing HTTP APIs, used by Naftiko as a source format for consuming and elevating existing APIs into capabilities. | Protocols & Standards |
| Orchestration Steps | Ordered sequences of API calls within a capability that support conditional logic, loops, parallel execution, and cross-source mapping. | Core Concepts |
| Output Parameters | Typed response fields with JSONPath mapping that shape what data a capability returns to its consumers. | Core Concepts |
| Progressive Abstraction | A four-level architecture for consuming APIs -- from forwarding HTTP client (L1) through templatized (L2) and structured (L3) to functional MCP (L4). | Core Concepts |
| REST API | An architectural style for networked applications using HTTP methods and resource-based URLs, one of the primary exposure adapters in Naftiko. | Protocols & Standards |
| Right-Sizing | The practice of exposing only what consumers need -- shaping API responses, context windows, and service boundaries to match specific use cases. | Core Concepts |
| Shadow MCP | Ungoverned MCP servers deployed outside official channels, creating security and compliance risks similar to shadow IT. | Governance |
| Source Adapter | The consumed API declaration in a capability spec that defines how the capability connects to upstream systems. | Core Concepts |
| Streamable HTTP | An MCP transport mode for remote server deployments where AI clients connect to MCP servers over HTTP with streaming support. | Protocols & Standards |
