Specification
The agreed set of properties and acceptance limits a material must meet to be fit for use.
What is a specification?
A specification is the agreed statement of what a material must be: the properties that matter, the test method used to measure each one, and the acceptance range each result must fall within. It is the reference against which a Certificate of Analysis is read — the certificate reports the measured results, and the specification says whether those results pass. Specifications are sometimes confused with technical data sheets, but they serve different purposes. A technical data sheet is descriptive and tells a formulator how a material typically behaves; a specification is contractual and defines the limits a delivered batch must satisfy. For a buyer assessing surplus material, the practical question is whether the seller's specification is the same one the buyer works to. Two batches of the same nominal material from different manufacturers can meet different specifications, and the difference decides whether the material can be used without requalification.
How Surply uses it
The specification is what the attached Certificate of Analysis is read against. Surply publishes the manufacturer's documents rather than restating their contents, so a buyer's quality function assesses the same paperwork the seller holds.
Also known as: spec sheet, technical data sheet, TDS, material spec.