"Proxy Alignment"?

Don't know anything about the specifics, but at a high level I'd guess the difference is between programming the rest of the system to accept the new box, or programming the new box to pretend to be the old one.

There are pros and cons of both approaches, but it is possible eg that the factory module can't be reprogrammed to pretend to be another and so the dealer workflow is to reprogram the whole system, but somebody has made an aftermarket modification (or a compatible box) which does allow 'pretending'. If there is any calibration required, perhaps it transfers the calibration from the old box to the new box, rather than doing a full recalibration as the dealer flow would do.

But maybe this aftermarket route doesn't help you if your module is so badly damaged that it isn't responding at all which would prevent it being cloned or the calibration read out.

But as I say I have no experience of this, this is just guesswork.

Theo

You suggestion is similar to my thoughts. I understand they could 'read' the old unit but it responded slowly- out of spec.

That suggests, perhaps, it would be possible read data from it and maybe use it to set up the new one.