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Plain-English definitions. Alphabetical.
| Term | In plain English |
|---|---|
| ActionProposal | “The AI thinks we should do this.” Not allowed to move motors directly. |
| Actuator | Something the robot moves: wheels, arm, gripper. |
| Agent | An AI worker with a goal, tools, and a plan block. |
| Behavior | Named robot logic — usually your main patrol() or run() entry point. |
| check | Compile/type-check without running. |
| Deploy | “This robot program targets this hardware board.” |
| Digital twin | A software shadow of the robot that mirrors pose/state for sim and replay. |
.sd file |
Spanda source file. |
| Emergency stop | Full stop — triggered by stop_if or safety rules. |
| Event | Named signal handlers can listen for (on MyEvent). |
| Fusion | Combining multiple sensor streams via observe { } + fusion.read(). |
| Hardware profile | Description of a board: CPU, memory, sensors, actuators. |
| LLM | Large language model — declared as ai_model ... LLM. |
| Module | Named file/unit for shared functions (module navigation;). |
| Mission trace | Recording of a sim run (.trace file) for replay and debugging. |
| Option | A value that might be missing (Some / None). |
| Result | Success or failure (Ok / Err) without exceptions. |
| SafeAction | Safety-approved motion command — only type actuators accept from AI. |
| Safety block | safety { } — max speed, stop conditions, zones. |
| Sensor | Input device: lidar, camera, IMU. |
| Spanda | The platform and language name; Sanskrit the divine pulse, pronounced SPUN-duh (/ˈspʌndə/). |
| sim | Run with verbose simulation output. |
| spawn | Queue a background function call. |
| Task | Periodic scheduled work (task foo every 50ms). |
| Trait | Interface an agent can implement (trait Navigator). |
| Trigger | “When X happens, run Y” — events, timers, conditions. |
| Twin | See digital twin. |
| Units | m/s, rad, m, ms — enforced by the compiler. |
| verify | Check program vs hardware profile before deploy. |
| Acronym | Meaning |
|---|---|
| CLI | Command-line interface (spanda in the terminal) |
| DAP | Debug Adapter Protocol (IDE debugging) |
| FFI | Foreign function interface — call C++/Python from Spanda |
| HAL | Hardware abstraction layer — board-specific imports |
| IMU | Inertial measurement unit (accelerometer + gyro) |
| Lidar | Laser distance sensor |
| LLM | Large language model |
| QoS | Quality of service (topic delivery guarantees) |
| ROS / ROS2 | Robot Operating System — messaging ecosystem |
| WASM | WebAssembly — run Spanda in the browser playground |
| I want to… | Read |
|---|---|
| Learn casually | This guide |
| Learn systematically | Spanda 101 |
| Look up syntax | spanda-language.md |
| Look up every function | spanda-reference.md |
| Install | installation.md |
| Impress my team | killer-demo.md |
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