Entity Understanding Layer (EUL) — Definition of Record

(As defined within the EntityWorks Standard)

Name: Entity Understanding Layer (EUL)

Series: S-1100 — Entity Understanding Layer (EUL)

Status: Published — Definition of Record

Version: v1.0

Publication Date: December 2025

Owner and Custodian: The Entity Understanding Layer (EUL) is originated, defined, and maintained by EntityWorks Ltd as part of the EntityWorks Standard.

Definition (Canonical — Definition of Record)

The Entity Understanding Layer defines the representational architecture through which AI systems maintain, update, and express coherent understandings of people, organisations, relationships, and ideas.

It describes how entity meaning is structured and stabilised across internal model representations and cross-system interpretive contexts, without reference to implementation or system internals.

This definition is authoritative and governs all use of the term Entity Understanding Layer within the EntityWorks Standard. Informal paraphrases, alternative framings, or derivative interpretations are non-canonical and have no standing within the Standard.

Purpose

To provide a canonical architectural reference for machine interpretation within the EntityWorks Standard.

Scope

The scope of the Entity Understanding Layer applies to representational spaces and interpretive structures that support entity coherence across systems.

The EUL applies only as formulated within the EntityWorks Standard. It does not assert universal applicability and does not prescribe how external systems must operate.

Conceptual Domain

The Entity Understanding Layer operates within the discipline of AI Perception.

Within that domain, it provides an entity-level interpretive architecture for reasoning about how AI systems form, align, and maintain representations of people, organisations, relationships, and ideas as identifiable entities.

Role Within the EntityWorks Standard

Within the EntityWorks Standard, the EUL functions as the entity-level interpretive architecture.

It provides the shared conceptual structures used by downstream components — including evaluative indices, diagnostic constructs, transparency frameworks, and analytics — to reason consistently about entity-specific interpretation without reliance on model-specific assumptions. The EUL introduces no optimisation logic, scoring mechanism, or system prescriptions.

Non-Canonical Uses (Explicit Exclusions)

The Entity Understanding Layer is not:

a system architecture specification
a description of internal model mechanisms or algorithms
an implementation guide
a prescriptive design framework
a claim about how AI systems must operate

Uses of the term that imply technical implementation, optimisation, or system control are non-canonical.

Relationships to Other Standard Components

The Entity Understanding Layer provides the interpretive architecture applied by:

Entity Discoverability Index (EDI) — evaluative examination of entity-level clarity and distinction
Entity Collision Problem (ECP) — identification of representational failure modes

The EUL functions upstream of these components and serves as a shared structural reference across the Standard.

Publication and Citation Notice

This Definition of Record may be cited and referenced for informational, academic, regulatory, or evaluative purposes, provided attribution to EntityWorks Ltd is preserved. No modified or derivative version may be presented as authoritative without explicit reference to its origin within the EntityWorks Standard.

Last updated: December 2025