- Chain digit: One hexadecimal message or checksum digit selecting a WOTS
signature position.
- Compression block: One 512-bit SHA-256 block processed through all 64
rounds and feed-forward.
- Context: Retained state for one live signer or verifier job sharing a hash
lane.
- Evidence tier: The execution boundary that directly supports a claim:
model, source, generated RTL, synthesis, route, or card.
- Fused output: The 2,208-byte signature and public key derived from the same
one-time private seed.
- Generation: A context-reuse epoch encoded into tags so a stale return
cannot be accepted as new work.
- Lane: One exact-64-cycle SHA-256 compression pipeline with opaque tag
transport.
- Legacy Keccak: Keccak-256 with the older
0x01 domain byte used by pinned
HashSigsRS. It is not SHA3-256.
- Nonclaim: A boundary the evidence explicitly does not establish.
- One-time key: A WOTS private key that may sign at most one message.
- Profile: The authenticated hash choice and byte domain. The two profiles
have distinct Rust types but equal serialized lengths.
- Topology 3×4: Three autonomous lane-local clusters with four contexts
each; the active signer and verifier structure.