Core Concepts

Three ideas explain almost everything about how Odal Node is built and why. Understand these and the rest of the documentation — and the code — reads easily. This page is the synthesis; each idea has a fuller treatment under Design Principles.

Proof-bound: the data stays yours

The most important decision in the project is that the operator’s raw source files never enter Odal’s systems. The manufacturer validates a passport locally, signs it with their own key, and the node discards the import files it was built from. What the node keeps and serves is the signed passport itself — the product data the operator chose to publish, every field bound to a proof and gated by access tier — not the raw exports, spreadsheets, or supply-chain detail behind it.

This is a property of the software, not a promise about our conduct. Because the node discards the source files after signing, the raw inputs behind a passport are gone — there is nothing for an operator, or for us, to hand over later. Verification needs only the signed passport and the manufacturer’s public identity; it does not need Odal to be online, or to exist.

A fuller treatment of the data boundary is in What Odal Node can and cannot see.

Open-core: a clean line between regulation and business

Odal Node is two parts with two licences. The core is the regulatory standard, open under Apache-2.0 — the rules a compliant passport must satisfy. The engine is the service that runs those rules in production, source-available under BSL-1.1 with a self-host grant.

One rule decides which side any change belongs on: if it changes because an EU regulation changed, it belongs in the core; if it changes because of how the system is deployed or operated, it belongs in the engine. The dependency only ever points one way — the engine uses the core; the core knows nothing of the engine.

A fuller treatment is in Licensing.

One seam for new regulation

Regulation arrives sector by sector, and it keeps moving. So the core is built around a single extension point: each sector’s compliance logic plugs in through one seam, and new sectors and revised rules enter there without changing anything around them.

The seam is technical, not commercial

That extension point is an architectural boundary, never a paywall. The built-in sectors and any added later use the same mechanism, and all of it is open — new regulatory coverage is never a paid unlock.

Where to go next

To run a node, start with the Quick Start. To understand what Odal Node can and cannot see, read What Odal Node can and cannot see. To check regulatory alignment, start with the ESPR Overview.