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Glossary

Control plane

The Tunnex API, web console, database, session store, and schedulers that own desired state. User traffic does not traverse it.

Data plane

WireGuard interfaces, routes, forwarding, NAT, and firewall policy applied on gateways and clients.

Gateway

A Linux host that terminates WireGuard, receives compiled state, routes private ranges, and optionally provides full-tunnel egress.

Gateway control channel

The raw mutually authenticated connection, normally TCP 8443, used for enrollment/reconciliation. It is separate from HTTPS console/API traffic.

Public endpoint

The host-or-ip:udp-port embedded for peers to dial a gateway. A blank endpoint describes an outbound-only NAT spoke, not a relay-backed gateway.

Site

A physical/cloud location with approved private ranges and one or more bound gateways.

Routed range

An approved CIDR projected into the organization address map. The Routed ranges page is read-only; site approval happens under Sites.

Device pool

The organization CIDR from which Tunnex assigns overlay addresses.

Split tunnel

Only Tunnex/private routes use the tunnel; other traffic uses the client’s normal network.

Full tunnel

Default traffic uses Tunnex and exits through an egress-capable gateway.

Private DNS profile

A site/gateway-specific set of zone suffixes and resolver endpoints. The most-specific suffix wins; unmatched names fail closed.

FQDN resource

One exact hostname used as a policy destination with inherited private resolver context.

Owner / admin / member

Organization roles. Owners control owner-only lifecycle/settings; admins handle delegated operations; members use normal access.

Device

A user-owned network principal with protocol, tunnel mode, address, gateway home, lifecycle, and optional managed posture.

Managed desktop profile

A macOS/Windows client identity that can receive managed lifecycle/routing and report posture.

Static/imported profile

A WireGuard/OpenVPN configuration containing one-time private material. It does not receive all managed client behavior.

Device approval

An organization setting that leaves future enrollments pending until an administrator approves them.

Posture

Client-reported facts such as disk encryption and OS version. It is defense in depth, not hardware attestation.

Subject/source

The person, group, site, CIDR, or agent allowed to initiate a governed flow.

Resource/destination

A named CIDR, FQDN, site/group, or exposed Kubernetes Service a subject may reach.

Rule/grant

An allow relationship from source to destination, optionally disabled or expiring.

Enforcement off

Rules are modeled/testable but the routed overlay remains open mesh.

Enforcing

Default deny: only matching allow rules pass.

Just-in-time (JIT) access

A reasoned, approval-gated request that becomes an expiring rule when approved.

Fronting site/gateway

The location and gateway path through which clients reach a registered cluster.

In-cluster connector

The component that reports cluster state and forwards synthetic Service VIPs to ready endpoints.

Synthetic VIP

An address allocated from the cluster’s Tunnex VIP range for an exposed Service.

GitOps-managed

The owning custom resource/operator is the source of truth; edit the CR, not the dashboard row.

Managed agent

A named non-human network principal with a human owner, lifecycle, runtime context, and normal policy scope.

Agent group

A managed-agent group used for reusable policy-template and MCP-profile inheritance.

MCP profile

A reusable credential-free MCP upstream definition assigned through an agent group.

Shadow inventory

Observed MCP servers/tools/resources/prompts reported for discovery without granting or executing them.

MCP proxy

The explicit local enforcement path for MCP tool policy. Direct upstream access can bypass tool controls unless network policy removes it.

Desired/applied revision

The control-plane policy version a gateway should run versus the version it reports successfully applied.

Leader/follower

Healthy API replicas can serve requests; only the PostgreSQL advisory-lock leader runs periodic schedulers.

Master key

The separately custodied 32-byte key used to seal sensitive database material. It is not contained in a usable form in a database dump.

Manifest

Backup metadata bound to a dump digest and keyed fingerprint, used to refuse a mismatched recovery set before database writes.

Documentation

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