---
title: Glossary
description: One-paragraph definitions for the terms used across these docs -- project, key, scope, grant, public id, access mode, and the five services.
---

# Glossary

## Project

The unit an account's resources belong to — every key has one **home
project**, and a call can reach a different project only if the caller
is a master key naming it directly, or an app key holding an explicit
grant on it. See [projects and scoping](/concepts/projects-and-scoping).

## Key (master / app)

An `shb_...` credential with a **tier**: **master** (full account
authority, mints and revokes other keys) or **app** (scoped to a subset
of `page`/`serve`/`link`/`base`, minted with a fixed `apps` list at
creation time). See [keys](/concepts/keys).

## Scope

What an app key's `apps` list, or an OAuth client's home project,
allows a given call to do — checked on every route, independent of
whether the credential is a key or a sherlock bearer token. A call
outside scope gets `403 insufficient_scope`. See
[keys](/concepts/keys), [API reference](/api).

## Grant

Per-project, per-key access to somewhere other than a key's home
project — `read` (list/view) or `full` (create/update/delete), set with
`project_grant_key` and revoked with `project_revoke_grant`. A grant on
one project says nothing about any other. See
[projects and scoping](/concepts/projects-and-scoping).

## Public id

The random, permanent 12-character identifier (`^[a-z2-7]{12}$`) every
published page and uploaded file gets at creation — what actually
appears in its `p.shebang.pro`/`f.shebang.pro` URL, assigned once and
never changed by renaming the resource's title or slug. See
[public ids and urls](/concepts/public-ids-and-urls).

## Access mode

The `private`/`password`/`allow_list`/`public` level every page, file,
and link carries, enforced by sherlink regardless of which of the three
public hosts serves it. See [access modes](/concepts/access-modes).

## sherlock

shebang's identity provider — the account behind the dashboard, the API
keys, and (as an OAuth 2.1/OIDC provider) sign-in for apps built on
shebang. See [sherlock](/sherlock).

## sherpage

Publishes a bundle of static files to a permanent `p.shebang.pro`
address, no build step or deploy pipeline. See [sherpage](/sherpage).

## sherserve

Uploads a single file — image, video, document, or archive — to a
permanent `f.shebang.pro` address. See [sherserve](/sherserve).

## sherlink

The short-link and access-policy layer (`sl.shebang.pro`) behind every
sherpage page and sherserve object — the single owner of access level,
password, expiry, and view budget for all three public hosts. See
[sherlink](/sherlink).

## sherbase

shebang's database service — a dedicated Postgres database and role per
slug, reachable by direct connection or through a Supabase-shaped Data
API. See [sherbase](/sherbase).