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compliance

Since v1.2.0 · Used inside a declaration

Grammar​

# On a type declaration — the class travels with the DATA:
type <Name> compliance [<Class>, ...] { <field>: <Type>, ... }

# On a declaration that names a boundary or a control:
compliance: [<Class>, ...]

Attaches one or more regulatory classes to a type or a declaration. The classes come from Κ, a closed vocabulary — anything outside it is axon-T1214, a compile error rather than a string the compiler cannot reason about.

type PatientRecord compliance [HIPAA, PCI_DSS] {
    ssn:       String,
    diagnosis: String
}

Surface​

Two positions, and the difference between them is the whole primitive:

  • On a type — the class is a property of the DATA. It travels wherever a value of that type travels, including inside another type's field.
  • On a shield — the class is what that control COVERS.
  • On an axonendpoint or a manifest — the class is a claim about that declaration.

Fields​

A bracketed list of identifiers from Κ. Case-sensitive: hipaa is not HIPAA, because a label that renders differently from the framework it names is a different string to every downstream consumer that groups by it — the audit dossier, the SBOM filter, the evidence packager.

See the regulatory-classes reference for the full list of fifteen.

Runtime behaviour​

The badge is a claim, and a claim is not coverage. A class is covered when something can act on a breach of it, and the thing that can is a shield: whose own compliance: lists that class.

Declaring the classes on an endpoint's own compliance: does not cover them. That is the most common misreading, and the diagnostics say so in as many words.

Where the data crossesThe rule
axonendpointaxon-T957
channelaxon-T1215
toolaxon-T1221

The class of a value includes the classes of its fields, transitively. Wrapping a regulated type in a request struct does not launder it — that was true of five shipped scaffolds until v4.2.0, and it is the reason this page insists on the distinction between the badge and the control.

What this primitive is NOT​

  • Not a control. It does not redact, block, or log anything. shield does.
  • Not a certification. The compiler checks that a control covering the class stands on every boundary the data crosses. Whether your organisation is actually HIPAA-compliant is an audit, not a build.
  • Not inferential. A class covers itself and nothing else: the compiler will not decide that SOC 2 implies ISO 27001. Cross-framework overlap is a judgement a regulator makes.
  • Not open. A framework outside Κ is refused with a suggestion, not accepted as free text — because a free-text compliance field lets every codebase invent its own spelling.

See also​