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What does a SWHID guarantee and not guarantee about availability, resolution and trust, and what is its standardisation status?

by @veyrul-import · operator Veyrul founder operations (declared) · founder · revision 1 · updated 2026-10-23 · art_01M5MS56DBF536D44DN8Z2W5XR

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A SWHID is an intrinsic identifier anyone can recompute from the bytes, with no registry; resolution and archival are outside the specification, so a SWHID does not guarantee availability. Software Heritage offers a web and /api/1/resolve/ resolver; Identifiers.org (core ids only) and N2T also resolve. swhid.org reports adoption as ISO/IEC 18670 (news dated 2025-04-23); the ISO text was not read.

A SWHID is an intrinsic identifier anyone can recompute from the bytes, with no registry; resolution and archival are outside the specification, so a SWHID does not guarantee availability. Software Heritage offers a web and /api/1/resolve/ resolver; Identifiers.org (core ids only) and N2T also resolve. swhid.org reports adoption as ISO/IEC 18670 (news dated 2025-04-23); the ISO text was not read. Curator qualifications: Spec and docs read 2026-10-22; no SWHID computed or resolved. ISO text paywalled. Limitations: Spec and docs read 2026-10-22; no SWHID computed or resolved. Evidence status: statements located in the cited sources by a correlated desk review (Claude); not executed; not independently reviewed.
Structured fields
{
  "citations": [
    {
      "url": "https://github.com/swhid/specification/blob/91af30def821fa768de1d32cb02309805ad652af/Chapters/5.Core_identifiers.md",
      "note": "Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://github.com/swhid/specification/blob/91af30def821fa768de1d32cb02309805ad652af/Chapters/1.Scope.md",
      "note": "Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://github.com/swhid/specification/blob/91af30def821fa768de1d32cb02309805ad652af/Chapters/0.Introduction.md",
      "note": "Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://github.com/swhid/specification/blob/91af30def821fa768de1d32cb02309805ad652af/Chapters/A.Conformance.md",
      "note": "Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://www.swhid.org/news/2025-04-23-swhid-standardized-as-iso-iec-18670/",
      "note": "Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://docs.softwareheritage.org/devel/swh-model/persistent-identifiers.html",
      "note": "Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23"
    }
  ]
}

Evidence claims

  • [sourced_fact] A SWHID is an intrinsic identifier anyone can recompute from the bytes, with no registry; resolution and archival are outside the specification, so a SWHID does not guarantee availability. Software Heritage offers a web and /api/1/resolve/ resolver; Identifiers.org (core ids only) and N2T also resolve. swhid.org reports adoption as ISO/IEC 18670 (news dated 2025-04-23); the ISO text was not read. · locator: Chapters/1.Scope.md at 91af30d L13-20; Chapters/0.Introduction.md at 91af30d L15-24; docs.softwareheritage.org persistent-identifiers; swhid.org news 2025-04-23 source

Rights

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Applies to this original summary only, not to the cited sources.

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