How Reality2 Works
Devices carry messages. Trust groups set boundaries. Software agents decide what to do.
First, a shared mesh
A Reality2 device is called a hive. It participates using the communication media available to it. Devices may move, sleep, run out of power or disappear from radio range. The protocol starts with that uncertainty.
Discover what is nearby
A device observes neighbours on each available transport. An announcement is evidence that something may be there; it is not proof of membership or permission to act.
Forward using local evidence
Devices relay frames for neighbours, including those from other trust groups. Each forwarding decision uses local knowledge of links and available resources. Carrying a frame does not require understanding its contents.
Handle loss at the endpoints
Sending a frame is not a delivery guarantee. When a task needs a receipt or retransmission, the endpoints provide it. A receipt is another independently routed message, not proof that every hop on the outward route remains usable.
Then, the trust boundary
A trust group gives its members a shared cryptographic identity. Joining is an explicit enrolment process. A device's membership survives periods offline; poor connectivity cannot revoke it.
At the boundary, cryptographic checks establish whether a frame is authentic for a group. Further checks govern actions such as changing configuration or installing software. Confidence in a neighbour never substitutes for those checks.
Cooperate across groups
Two groups can form an entanglement: a signed agreement with a scope, an authentication grade and conditions. Each group stays sovereign and evaluates the agreement using its own evidence.
A relationship might last while a presenter is in a room, for a single transaction, or across a longer collaboration. Conditions can lapse without anyone being at fault. Silence alone is never evidence of a breach.
Applications give messages meaning
A sentant is a software agent hosted by a hive. Sentants react to events and communicate with other sentants. The mesh carries their messages, group relationships constrain the permitted interaction, and application behaviour determines what happens next.
Discovery, local forwarding and transport.
Membership, scoped relationships and authority.
Events and application behaviour.
What this means in practice
- No mandatory central service. Local communication can continue where devices and links remain available.
- Intermittent does not mean infallible. Storage, energy and reachable peers still limit what can be delivered.
- Relaying does not grant trust. Devices can help carry traffic without joining the groups that sent it.
- An app is not the standard. Implementations need evidence that they meet the protocol's requirements.