Modelers, researchers, and developers working with generative models and wanting interoperable notation.
A text-based notation system for communicating generative models and Active Inference systems.
On this page
Generalized Notation Notation (GNN) is a text-based notation project for communicating and specifying generative models. It provides a shared language for describing Active Inference and related models in a way that is both human-readable and machine-processable, enabling interoperability across tools and codebases.
GNN defines a notation system for generative models used in Active Inference and related frameworks. By standardizing how models are described, GNN enables clearer communication between researchers, easier translation between implementations, and more robust tooling around model specification and analysis.
GNN was originally published as Smékal and Friedman (2023) in the Active Inference Journal, archived openly on Zenodo.
GNN has an active repository and has been used across several Institute projects. Documentation and examples are available through the repository.
Contributions include specification work, tooling development, documentation, and applying GNN to new modeling domains. Background in formal modeling or Active Inference is helpful.
Key surfaces
Related resources
External links are resolved from the shared registry so visitor-facing destinations stay centralized and checkable.
Audience: Newcomer
Primary public community channel for conversation, coordination, and newcomer orientation.
Audience: Researcher
Public ecosystem shortlink for Institute context, projects, activities, and conceptual maps.
Audience: Developer
Public GitHub organization for Institute repositories and open-source work.
Audience: Developer
Project repository for multiagent Active Inference modeling work.
Audience: Developer
Generalized Notation Notation project repository for model communication.
Audience: Developer
Geospatial modeling repository connected to ecological and bioregional applications.
Audience: Researcher
Research and publication-oriented repository for the Active Inference Journal.
Audience: Researcher
External paper repository surfaced from the official research page.
Audience: Researcher
Reachable arXiv reference surfaced from the official research page.
Audience: Researcher
Reachable arXiv reference surfaced from the official research page.
Audience: Researcher
Reachable Zenodo research reference surfaced from the official research page.
Audience: Researcher
Reachable Zenodo research reference surfaced from the official research page.
Official pages
Audience: Contributor
Public projects shortlink for project directories and activity-linked work.
Audience: Contributor
Public project measurement shortlink for reporting progress and outputs.
Audience: Researcher
Public Active Inference Ontology shortlink for shared conceptual infrastructure.
Audience: Contributor
Public Project Preparation shortlink for making proposed work legible and actionable.
Audience: Researcher
Public Wave Hypothesis shortlink.
Repositories
Audience: Researcher
Computational meta-analysis of Active Inference literature with nanopublication and knowledge-graph outputs.
Audience: Learner
Active Inference and RxInfer.jl
Audience: Researcher
Ontology-oriented repository for shared Active Inference concepts and decentralized science knowledge infrastructure.
Audience: Developer
Notebook-based applied Active Inference work connected to blockchain-adjacent and generative modeling examples.
Audience: Developer
Python models and materials for ant-inspired multiagent Active Inference.
Audience: Researcher
Active Inference & Category Theory
Audience: Researcher
Public content repository for the Active Inference Journal and related publication infrastructure.
Audience: Researcher
Active Entity Ontology for Science