Glossary

The goal of this page is to help keep documentation, discussions, and APIs consistent.

Term	Meaning
Activator	Part of a Registration that, given a Context and a set of Parameters, can create a Component Instance bound to that Context
Argument	A formal argument to a constructor on a .NET type
Component	A body of code that declares the Services it provides and the Dependencies it consumes
Instance	A .NET object obtained by Activating a Component that provides Services within a Container (also Component Instance)
Container	A construct that manages the Components that make up an application
Context	A bounded region in which a specific set of Services is available
Dependency	A Service required by a Component
Lifetime	A duration bounded by the Activation of an Instance and its disposal
Parameter	Non-Service objects used to configure a Component
Registration	The act of adding and configuring a Component for use in a Container, and the information associated with this process
Scope	The specific Context in which Instances of a Component will be shared by other Components that depend on their Services
Service	A well-defined behavioral contract shared between a providing and a consuming Component; generally these are interfaces, or some abstraction of a Component

Admittedly this seems a bit low-level to fit with the typical idea of a ‘universal language’, but within the domain of IoC containers and specifically Autofac these can be viewed as concepts rather than implementation details.

Some more detail on the relationship between a Service and a Component Registration in Autofac terms can be found in the registration documentation.

Wild deviations from these terms in the API or code should be fixed or raised as issues to fix in a future version.

The terms Application, Type, Delegate, Object, Property etc. have their usual meaning in the context of .NET software development.