Core concepts

Moments, signals, patterns, and coverage power all three interfaces: Profile, Query, and Search.

Moments#

Related photos captured around the same real-world event are treated as a single moment rather than dozens of independent images.

This prevents twenty photos from one dinner from appearing twenty times more important than one photo from another dinner.

Moments power local retrieval through search(). Their derived evidence also contributes to Profile and can support Query without exposing local assets through the context service.

Signals#

Signals are recurring pieces of context inferred across multiple moments.

• frequently visits coffee shops
• repeatedly photographs live music
• travels several times per year
• increasingly interested in climbing
• regularly spends weekends outdoors

Signals carry strength, confidence, and supporting evidence. They contribute to Profile’s preferences, affinities, and recurring activities.

Patterns#

Patterns describe recurring behavior over time.

• typical activity frequency
• weekday vs. weekend behavior
• seasonality
• recent increases or decreases

Profile maintains these patterns over time. Query can use Profile and underlying derived evidence to answer a question the application did not anticipate.

Coverage#

Coverage tells your product how much evidence currently supports a response.

A Profile based on six months of partial history should not be treated the same way as one backed by several years of processed moments. Query reports question-specific evidence; Search is limited to authorized, indexed local media. No result does not mean no such moment ever happened.