Glossary

Definition

A JSON file at view/adminhtml/<type>/<id>.json that describes a grid, a form or a snippet. The file name is the id.

Overlay

A definition with the same type and id as one shipped by another module. The engine deep-merges overlays over the base in module load order.

Base

The first definition the loader finds for an id, in module load order. Usually the one in the module that owns the screen.

Merger

The deep-merge with $remove, id-keyed list merging and position ordering. See The definition engine.

Resolver

The service that returns the merged definition for a type and id, live, from cache, or from the compiled manifest depending on deploy mode.

Manifest

generated/nebula/definitions.php, written by nebula:compile. The only definition source in production mode.

Alias

A string in a definition that names a PHP binding declared in di.xml: a data provider, a collection, an option source, a save handler, a selection source. Definitions never name classes.

Registry

The DI-configured map from alias to class for one kind of binding.

Provider

The class that returns rows for a grid or a record for a form, chosen by dataSource.provider.

Collection provider

grid.collection, the provider that wraps any Magento collection by alias.

Route mounting

A form definition's route, routeWhen, replaces and replacesClass keys, which inject the form into a page's layout and remove the core blocks.

Snippet

A reusable template, badge map or layout row, used from a column, fieldset or section with renderer: "snippet.<id>".

View model

A class bound to a snippet id in SnippetViewModelRegistry and passed to the snippet template as view_model.

Renderer pool

The registry that maps column and field types to renderer classes.

Layout tree

The layout key of a form: rows, columns, tabs and sections that place fields. Used by EAV forms and by some flat forms instead of fieldsets.

EAV form

A form with "type": "eav" whose fields come from attribute metadata. Products, categories and customers.

Quick edit

The drawer that edits one grid row in place, enabled by a grid's editable block.

Saved view

A named filter, sort and column set an administrator saves on a grid.

Skin

A JSON file under view/adminhtml/nebula/skin/ that sets design tokens. Selected by nebula/theme/skin.

Token

A CSS custom property named --nebula-* or --color-nebula-* that the theme's stylesheet reads.

Model store

Alpine.store('nebulaModels'), which owns every form field's value in the browser and serialises them on submit.

Core bundle

nebula-core.js, loaded on every admin page, containing Alpine.js and the shared components.

Stand-down

A Nebula block or plugin doing nothing because AdminThemeStateInterface::isNebulaRendering() answered false, which happens when the theme switcher has selected another admin theme.

UI Bridge

A separate package that converts third-party UI Component grids and forms into Nebula definitions at runtime.

UI transformer

nebula:ui:transform, which converts UI Component XML into draft definitions offline.

Gate

A structural check in the source repository that must be green before a merge.