Binding

A scoped or time-bounded relationship between two entities — the junction-table pattern promoted to a first-class primitive. Use when a relationship has scope, time, or its own attributes; use a frontmatter cross-reference field otherwise.

ID prefix	BIND
State machine	none
MCP server	binding-management
Skill	binding-management (Layer 2)

When to use a Binding vs a cross-reference

Situation	Use
"A blocks B"	frontmatter blocks: [BACK-...]
"Alice is a developer" (globally)	Actor's roles: [ROLE-...]
"Alice is tech lead on Project X for Q2 2026"	Binding
"Security gate applies to this release WorkItem on main"	Binding
"Sprint 7 scopes these work items for Apr 1-14"	Binding

Fields

Required

Field	Type	Description
type	string	Freeform binding type (see conventions below)
subject	string	Entity on the "from" side
target	string	Entity on the "to" side

Optional

Field	Type	Description
subject_kind	string	Primitive kind of subject
target_kind	string	Primitive kind of target
scope	SCOPE-*	Scope within which the binding applies
valid_from	string	When binding starts (date or ISO 8601 datetime)
valid_until	string	When binding stops
conditions	object	Freeform constraints attached to binding
description	string	One-line human-readable summary

Type conventions

Type	Meaning
role-assignment	Actor → Role (scoped)
work-assignment	Actor → WorkItem (assigned to sprint/scope)
workitem-gate	WorkItem → Gate (this gate guards this run or task)
scope-gate	Scope → Gate (this gate applies within this scope)
time-window	Entity → Artifact/Scope (time or recurrence contract)
budget-application	Artifact → WorkItem/Scope (cost policy applies here)
constraint-scope	Constraint → Scope (constraint applies in this scope)
category-assignment	Entity → Category value

Process and Schedule are not v2 Binding endpoints. Legacy process-gate, process-scope, and schedule-scope records should be migrated to concrete WorkItem, Scope, Artifact, Gate, or time-window relationships.

Example

---
apiVersion: processkit.projectious.work/v1
kind: Binding
metadata:
  id: BIND-20260411_0908-WarmOak-alice-techlead-q2
  created: '2026-04-11T09:08:00Z'
spec:
  type: role-assignment
  subject: ACTOR-20260411_0906-alice
  target: ROLE-20260411_0907-ClearOak-tech-lead
  scope: SCOPE-20260410_q2-2026
  valid_from: '2026-04-01'
  valid_until: '2026-06-30'
  description: Alice is tech lead on the processkit project for Q2 2026
---

Notes

• end_binding closes a binding by setting valid_until to the current datetime — use this rather than deleting the entity.
• resolve_bindings_for returns all active bindings for a given subject, useful for "who is currently assigned to what" queries.