AAOE — AI-Agent-Orchestrated Engineering

The AAOE Glossary standardizes the vocabulary used across AAOE's Governance, Operating Model, Standards, Discoveries, Reference Architectures, Case Studies, and Guides. It does not introduce new concepts — every definition is derived from existing canonical AAOE documentation, and each entry cites the documents it was drawn from.

Terms that are used within AAOE documentation but do not yet have a single canonical definition are marked as candidates for future refinement within their entry, rather than given an invented definition.

By Domain

Engineering

Term	Summary
Specification	Canonical, authoritative engineering guidance derived from approved knowledge
Specification Lifecycle	The governed states a Specification progresses through
Shared Specification	A Specification used to coordinate multiple independent implementations
Specification-Driven Development	Defining Specifications before implementation begins
Discovery	Evidence-based engineering knowledge captured from practical work
Work Order	The canonical interface between Architecture and Implementation
Architecture Review	Evaluation of completed work against approved architectural intent
Architecture Decision Record (ADR)	The persistent record of an accepted Architectural Decision
Implementation Report	The standard record produced after a Work Order is fulfilled
Engineering Intent	Objectives, constraints, and expected behavior captured explicitly
Acceptance Criteria	How it will be known that engineering work is done correctly
Constraint	An explicit boundary on how a Work Order's objective may be achieved
Scope	What is, and is not, included in a Work Order

AI Collaboration

Term	Summary
AI Collaborator (candidate)	Informal term for an AI participating in engineering work
Human Governance	Humans review and approve AI-assisted work before it becomes official
Multi-Agent Engineering	Organizing work across multiple specialized AI agents
Orchestration	Coordinating agents' dependencies, sequencing, feedback, and review
Responsibility	A specific duty assigned to a role, human or AI
Validation	Confirming that work, or a Discovery, meets its stated criteria

Knowledge

Term	Summary
Context	The information required for effective engineering collaboration
Context Engineering	Intentionally designing and governing engineering context
Organizational Knowledge	Engineering knowledge that persists beyond the task that produced it
Engineering Memory (candidate)	Preserved reasoning that outlives the people who produced it
Shared Context	The common context multiple participants collaborate around
Traceability	The evidence chain connecting observations to engineering outcomes

Architecture

Term	Summary
Capability	A logical function described independently of its implementation
Boundary	An explicit limit on what a role, capability, or agent may do
Decision (candidate)	The act of evaluating evidence and approving a direction
Trade-off (candidate)	A consequence accepted in exchange for a benefit
Assumption (candidate)	Something taken as true without direct verification

Operating Model

Term	Summary
Workflow (candidate)	The preferred ordered sequence of stages for a given practice
Artifact	Any governed engineering document or output
Lifecycle (candidate)	The ordered governed states an artifact or knowledge type progresses through
Governance	How engineering knowledge is created, validated, and evolved
Review (candidate)	An evaluation of an engineering artifact before acceptance