Pipe Properties
Every IntentText block follows the same grammar:
keyword: content | property: value | property: value
Properties appear after the pipe separator | (space-pipe-space). Any keyword can carry any property — the parser preserves everything without error.
Syntax rules
- Split on
|(space-pipe-space) - First segment →
keyword: content - Every subsequent segment →
key: value - Escaped pipe
\|is treated as a literal character, not a separator - Unknown properties are stored, queryable, and carried through merge
- For
code:, triple backticks delimit the value — everything between```and```is the content, properties go after the closing backticks
text: Payment due in 30 days | color: red | id: payment-note
quote: The only limit is imagination | by: Anonymous | size: 1.2em
code: ```fetch("/api/data")``` | lang: js
Reserved characters & escaping
| (space-pipe-space) is the only reserved delimiter in a line. Two escape sequences exist, and they are all you ever need:
- Literal pipe — write
\|(backslash-pipe). Works in content and in property values. - Literal backslash — write
\\(double backslash).
task: Review the A \| B comparison | owner: Ada
Windows path: C:\\Users\\ahmed\\docs
metric: Margin | value: 40\|60 split
The parser unescapes \| and \\ anywhere in content and property values, and the serializer re-escapes them on output — so escape round-trips are a stable fixpoint. A parsed-and-reserialized document never silently turns a literal pipe back into a property delimiter.
Colons need no escaping. Only the first word-plus-colon of a line is interpreted as a keyword — every later colon is plain text:
quote: He said: watch this | by: Ada
Schedule — 09:00: standup, 14:30: review
The only edge case: starting a line's prose with something that looks like a keyword. total: 50 on its own line would parse as a custom total block — if you mean it as text, say so explicitly:
text: total: 50
Standard properties by keyword
Each keyword documents its own properties on its reference page. Here is a cross-reference of common properties and where they appear.
Identity properties
| Property | Used by | Description |
|---|---|---|
by: | quote:, approve:, sign:, audit:, revision:, amendment: | Author or attribution |
at: | image:, audit:, approve:, sign:, freeze:, revision:, amendment: | File path, URL, or ISO 8601 timestamp |
id: | Any block | Explicit block identifier |
ref: | ref:, approve:, amendment: | Reference identifier or cross-reference |
Structural properties
| Property | Used by | Description |
|---|---|---|
section: | revision:, amendment: | Section the block relates to |
was: | revision:, amendment: | Previous value |
now: | revision:, amendment: | New value |
label: | signline: | Text below the signature line |
width: | signline: | Width of the signature line |
Data properties
| Property | Used by | Description |
|---|---|---|
format: | input:, output: | Data format (json, csv, xml) |
schema: | input: | Expected schema |
type: | meta:, ref: | Type classification |
unit: | metric: | Unit of measurement |
value: | metric: | Numeric value |
target: | metric: | Target value |
min: | metric: | Minimum acceptable value |
max: | metric: | Maximum acceptable value |
trend: | metric: | up, down, flat |
Agent properties
| Property | Used by | Description |
|---|---|---|
depends: | step: | Step dependency (runs after) |
input: | step: | Input data reference |
output: | step: | Output data reference |
tool: | step:, tool: | Tool reference |
model: | step: | AI model to use |
status: | step: | Execution status |
confidence: | step: | Confidence threshold (0–1) |
approver: | gate: | Required approver |
fallback: | gate: | Step if approval times out |
if: | decision:, policy: | Condition to evaluate |
then: | decision: | Branch if true |
else: | decision: | Branch if false |
event: | trigger: | Triggering event |
scope: | policy:, context: | Scope boundary |
always: | policy: | Unconditional rule |
never: | policy: | Prohibition rule |
action: | policy: | Response when policy fires |
requires: | policy: | Required block type |
notify: | policy: | Alert target |
timeout: | step: | Maximum execution time |
retries: | step: | Number of retry attempts |
priority: | step: | Execution priority |
phase: | step: | Pipeline phase |
Trust properties
| Property | Used by | Description |
|---|---|---|
role: | approve:, sign:, signline:, contact: | Person's role |
hash: | sign:, freeze:, amendment: | Content hash |
approved-by: | amendment: | Amendment approver |
Layout properties
| Property | Used by | Description |
|---|---|---|
size: | page:, font:, header:, footer:, watermark: | Dimensions or font size |
margins: | page: | Page margins |
orientation: | page: | portrait or landscape |
body: | font: | Body font family |
heading: | font: | Heading font family |
mono: | font: | Monospace font family |
align: | header:, footer: | Text alignment |
color: | watermark: | Color value |
opacity: | watermark: | Opacity (0–1) |
angle: | watermark: | Rotation angle |
end: | title:, section:, sub:, text:, prose | Two-sided row — value rendered at the line end |
leading: | Any text-bearing block | Line height (leading: 1.9) |
space-before: | Any text-bearing block | Space above the block |
space-after: | Any text-bearing block | Space below the block |
Two-sided rows — end:
end: renders a block as a two-sided row: the content sits at the line start, the
end: value at the line end — the invoice/report "label left, value right" pattern:
title: Invoice INV-2026-042 | end: 2026-06-12
text: Customer | end: Acme Corp
section: Payment Terms | end: Net 30
It works on title:, section:, sub:, text:, and prose blocks. The row is flex
start/end, so RTL documents flip it automatically — no extra markup. The end: value is
bidi-isolated (dir="auto"), so a date or amount keeps its internal order inside an
Arabic line. leading:, space-before:, and space-after: are spacing props — see
Style Properties for the full mapping.
Direction — RTL and bidi isolation
Direction is automatic and per-value:
- A document with Arabic (or other RTL) content flips to
dir="rtl"automatically; all built-in CSS uses logical properties, so tables, quotes, callouts, and splits mirror correctly without configuration. - Override explicitly with
meta: | dir: rtl(ordir: ltr) — the explicit value beats auto-detection in either direction. The Arabic localized keyword works too:بيانات: | dir: rtl. - Mixed-language values stay readable. Table cells, task owner/due dates, metric
values, deadline dates, contact email/phone, and
end:values carrydir="auto"— each value resolves its own direction from its first strong character, so10,200 QARand2026-06-20keep their internal order inside RTL lines. Never manually reorder or pad mixed-language values.
Open-ended properties
Properties are fully open-ended. The parser stores everything — any key: value pair is valid:
text: Custom data | department: Engineering | priority: high | reviewed: true
Custom properties are preserved in parsed output, appear in queries, and survive merge operations. This makes .it files extensible without schema changes.
One convention applies across all properties: the date-bearing keys (date, due, at, expires, issued) hold ISO 8601 values (2026-03-09 or 2026-03-09T14:00:00Z). Locale formats are ambiguous and break date-range queries — the validator flags them with a DATE_NOT_ISO warning.
Reserved value conventions
A handful of property keys carry a reserved shape so a machine can compute on the value without bespoke string parsing. The shape is a convention, not a separate type — the source string always stays the byte-of-record.
Money & quantities (value: + unit:)
On a metric: (and any value/unit pair), value: holds the bare magnitude — no
thousands separators, no currency symbol — and unit: holds either the currency as an
ISO-4217 code (QAR, USD, EUR) or the unit (%, years, points):
metric: Total Due | value: 17325 | unit: QAR // money 17325 QAR
metric: VAT | value: 5 | unit: % // percent 5
metric: Investment | value: 3.80M | unit: QAR // money 3800000 QAR
metric: Velocity | value: 42 | unit: points // quantity 42 points
A K/M/B/T magnitude suffix and a trailing % are tolerated and expanded on read.
This is the arithmetic-friendly form the e-invoice export (buildUBLInvoice) consumes. Do
not write value: $17,325 or value: 17,325 QAR — keep the currency symbol and
separators out of value:.
Reading a typed value — readTypedValue / metricTypedValue
@dotit/core reads the reserved shape with a pure, read-only helper — it never
re-serializes, so reading a typed value can never affect a seal:
import { readTypedValue, metricTypedValue } from "@dotit/core";
readTypedValue("17325", "QAR");
// → { raw: "17325", number: 17325, unit: "QAR", currency: "QAR", kind: "money" }
readTypedValue("5", "%");
// → { raw: "5", number: 5, unit: "%", currency: null, kind: "percent" }
readTypedValue("42", "points");
// → { raw: "42", number: 42, unit: "points", currency: null, kind: "quantity" }
readTypedValue("hello");
// → { raw: "hello", number: null, unit: null, currency: null, kind: "text" }
// Convenience for a metric block (reads its value:/unit: properties):
metricTypedValue(block); // → TypedValue
The returned TypedValue is { raw, number, unit, currency, kind }, where kind is one of
money | percent | quantity | number | text. currency is set only when unit: is
a valid ISO-4217 code. raw is always the source string verbatim — the byte-of-record.
Actor keys — owner: vs by:
The two "who" keys name distinct roles — they are not synonyms:
| Key | Names… | Used on |
|---|---|---|
owner: | the party responsible for a task | task:, metric: |
by: | the actor who performed a recorded action | approve:, sign:, amendment:, audit:, quote attribution |
task: Ship the auth flow | owner: Ada // Ada is accountable
approve: Reviewed | by: Sarah | role: manager | at: 2026-03-20 // Sarah performed the approval
For when, pair these with the temporal keys: at: for an event/approval/signature
timestamp, due: for a future deadline, and date:/issued:/expires: for labelled dates
(all ISO 8601).
Prose-pipe safety — the PROSE_PIPE_SUSPECT lint
Because | is the property delimiter, a literal | in prose is parsed as a property. On a
prose block (text:, quote:), a segment whose key is not a known presentation/layout
or attribution key is very likely swallowed literal text, so the semantic validator emits a
warning with code PROSE_PIPE_SUSPECT:
text: Compare plan A | plan B side by side
// ⚠ PROSE_PIPE_SUSPECT — '| plan B side by side' was parsed as a property
It is a lint only — it never changes parsing, so it cannot affect a seal. The fix is to
escape the literal pipe as \|:
Compare plan A \| plan B side by side
Recognized prose keys (which do not trigger the warning) include the style/layout props
plus the legitimate prose/quote metadata by, author, source, cite, role, at,
caption, title, name, date, due, time.