Terminology

Before you get too far ahead, take a minute to familiarize yourself with our terminology – we'll be referencing this often throughout our guides.

Term	Definition
Workflow	Workflows comprise integrations. Assume you've build a workflow that runs every time a new transaction is recorded in a customer's Accounting system. You've configured that workflow to route that data to a Snowflake data warehouse. This workflow would contain two blocks: (1) an Accounting event and (2) a Snowflake destination.
Integration	An integration is a combination of workflows centered around a Third Party App. For instance, your accounting workflow mentioned above might be just one of series. When combined, these workflows comprise an integration.
Block	A block represents a Third Party App (3PA) integration on the Alloy platform. We have three core types of blocks: (a) Third Party Apps such as NetSuite, Salesforce, Shopify, etc (b) Utility blocks commonly used for data manipulation and (c) Logic blocks designed to set up workflow rules like conditional logic or loops. You can chain blocks together to create workflows.
Event (aka Trigger block)	An event invokes a workflow. We support two types of events: realtime and polling. Realtime events use webhook subscriptions to provide real time alerts. Polling triggers are recurring jobs regularly check if data changed in a Third Party App every few minutes. While not as realtime as webhooks, polling triggers allow you to create near realtime alerts when the underlying Third Party App does not support webhooks natively.
Destination (aka Action block)	A destination, also known as an "Action Block", specifies where you want to send the data invoked by the trigger block. For example, if you wanted to route order data from Shopify to a Google Pub/Sub ingest, then the Google Pub/Sub block would be the destination.
Custom Event	A Custom Event is used to invoke a workflow from your application and can be called via the Alloy Embedded REST API. You can associate multiple workflows with a single Custom Event. Whenever you trigger the Custom Event, every workflow with this event will be triggered.
App Action	An app action is counted every time a workflow moves data or takes action for you. Let's assume your workflow has a Shopify trigger that sends a message to your Snowflake instance each time an order is placed. This would be counted as two (2) app actions each time the workflow is invoked.
Workflow Run	A workflow run refers to each time an entire workflow is invoked. This can include any number of actions within it. For example, if your workflow runs once every hour during a day, then there will be 24 workflow runs.
Iterate Block	Iterate blocks allow you to perform operations on each item within a list. For example, you could use an iterate block to page through a list of orders.
Branch and Conditional Blocks	Branch and conditional blocks are logic blocks. These blocks are similar to `if/else` and `switch`statements in code. You can use them to define logical rules regarding what your workflow should or should not do.
Workflow Logs	Workflow logs store the execution results every time a workflow is run. Workflow log data is available for 60 days on the Alloy Embedded platform.
Manual Workflow Block	A manual workflow block only runs when the user presses the “Run” button in order to trigger the workflow. Manual workflows are useful for running workflows at your discretion.
Variable	Variables allow you to use the outputs of blocks as input for other blocks downstream. Inputs refers to the fields you must map when configuring blocks. For example, if you use a Shopify event, it might return output containing a customer's email, phone number, etc. This data is then accessible as variable data and could be mapped to your destination.
Variable Selector	The variable selector shows a list of all possible data points for a given block.