Canonization Epochs ​

An epoch is a bounded step of network canonization.

In Realith, an epoch is not merely a portion of time and not a decorative unit for partitioning a log.

Epochs ​

Epochs are needed so that the network can:

• accept admissible transitions not as an infinite indistinguishable flow;
• periodically fix a verifiable outcome;
• link one step of canon to the next;
• make the current result the basis for further work;
• limit the working surface of the canon.

What happens within an epoch ​

At the architectural level, an epoch includes:

• intake of candidate transitions;
• verification of their admissibility;
• fixation of what entered the canon;
• separation of accepted material from conflicting or rejected material;
• publication of the new outcome state of the period.

At the current stage, there is no need to pretend that the final low-level profile of the epoch is already defined.
But epoch logic itself is already part of the architecture.

Realith is oriented not only to the history of events, but also to the retention of canonical current state.
That is why the network needs a mechanism that allows it:

• not to dissolve the canon into an endless flow of messages;
• not to force every working node to live permanently inside the whole raw past;
• to have distinguishable points of outcome fixation.

The epoch is precisely such a point.

What an epoch does not mean ​

An epoch does not mean that causal discipline disappears inside it.
Nor does it mean that everything prior becomes irrelevant.

An epoch means something narrower:
the network receives a bounded step of fixation of a canonical outcome.