Account
A Solana account stores data at an address and has an owner program. The owner program controls changes to its data; accounts can also hold lamports.
Expert · SOURCE-LINKED DEFINITIONS
Solana glossary
Plain-language terms from this course. Reviewed 2026-09-30; check the linked docs for current protocol behavior.
Atomicity
A transaction's instructions execute as one unit: if an instruction fails, state changes from the transaction are rolled back, while a transaction fee may still be charged.
Transactions ↗ Read: 2. Authority, signatures, and replay resistance →
Commitment
A request setting that tells an RPC client how much confirmation to require when reading state or tracking a transaction. The choice affects confidence and freshness.
Cross-program invocation (CPI)
A call from one Solana program into another during transaction execution. The caller supplies the accounts; signer privilege can be forwarded or established for its own PDA with invoke-signed.
Delegate
An authority explicitly permitted to perform limited actions. For a token account, a delegate's approved amount and authority differ from a mint-level PermanentDelegate extension.
SPL Token Basics ↗ Read: 4. Public data, privacy, and token design →
Durable nonce
A mechanism that lets a transaction use a stored nonce value instead of a short-lived recent blockhash, supporting offline signing or delayed submission. Solana's current docs say durable nonces may be deprecated in a future release, so check the latest guidance before designing around them.
Durable Nonces ↗ Read: 2. Authority, signatures, and replay resistance →
Finality
The confirmation state reached when the cluster recognizes a block as finalized with maximum lockout. For finalized evidence, retain the cluster and commitment context from the RPC response.
Confirmation and Commitment ↗ Read: 6. Production operations and incident response →
Mint account
An account owned by a token program that stores a token's supply, decimals, mint authority, freeze authority, and any configured token extensions.
SPL Token Basics ↗ Read: 4. Public data, privacy, and token design →
PermanentDelegate
An optional Token-2022 mint extension that assigns a mint-level delegate with transfer and burn authority across token accounts for that mint. Individual token-account owners cannot revoke it.
Permanent Delegate ↗ Read: 4. Public data, privacy, and token design →
Program-derived address (PDA)
A deterministic off-curve address derived from seeds, a bump, and a program ID. It has no private key; its deriving program can sign for it in a CPI with invoke-signed.
Program upgrade authority
The authority that can authorize an upgrade for an upgradeable program. A program's deployment and upgrade-control state are separate from its runtime instructions.
Programs ↗ Read: 6. Production operations and incident response → Read: 4. Public data, privacy, and token design →
Replay protection
Application checks that prevent a previously accepted authorization or action from being used again, often by recording a nonce or consumed state. Transaction freshness alone may not protect an application's business action.
Transactions ↗ Read: 2. Authority, signatures, and replay resistance →
Token-2022
The Token Extension Program, a token program compatible with familiar token operations and supporting optional mint and token-account extensions. Inspect the actual program and configured extensions before relying on token behavior.
Token Extensions ↗ Read: 4. Public data, privacy, and token design →
Transaction
A signed message containing one or more instructions, a fee payer, and a recent blockhash or durable nonce. Validators execute it and return a status that should be checked on the intended cluster.
Transactions ↗ Read: 6. Production operations and incident response →