Robert Allan JamesandClaude Sonnet 5
1a263555e2
Root cause (found by a fresh subagent after an extended live-debugging investigation into "identity 00 attaches slowly/stalls when Zuse never attached first this boot"): blk_migration_idle_check() was generalized earlier today to walk every attached device slot uniformly instead of hardcoding first_disk_slot() (Artemis's own disk). But its per-slot scan can only early-exit once it finds a devblock that is BOTH "hot" (claimed and worn) AND "free" -- and a just-attached, never-claimed USB identity drive can never satisfy the "hot" half by design (claiming only ever happens via blk_firsttouch_claim(), which only ever targets first_disk_slot()). So the scan ran to completion -- the drive's entire ~16,000 devblocks, mostly cache misses over slow emulated USB/BOT -- every single idle tick, forever, blocking sk_repl_idle() (and therefore the console and the storage-attach message round-trip) each time. Fix, in src/block_subsystem.c: a new has_ever_claimed flag on blk_dev_slot_t (set in blk_set_meta(), the single choke point every BLK_FLAG_CLAIMED transition passes through) skips the scan entirely, O(1), for any slot nothing has ever claimed -- the common case for a freshly-attached drive. A new migration_scan_lbn resume cursor bounds *any* slot's per-tick cost to MIGRATION_SCAN_BUDGET (256) devblocks examined, picking up where the previous tick left off instead of restarting from start_lbn every time -- restores this function's own documented "coarse cadence, cheap early-exit" design intent for every device, not just the one it used to hardcode. Also along the way (kept, all real improvements, verified live): - src/starkernel/usb/xhci.c: xhci_wait_bit()/xhci_bot_wait_for_idle() had zero yield hints in their MMIO-polling loops; added arch_relax() to both (matches virtio_blk.c below) -- a tight loop of nothing but MMIO reads can starve TCG's own host-side timer injection under QEMU. - src/starkernel/virtio/virtio_blk.c: vblk_io()'s spin bound was 33M iterations with zero logging on timeout; a single real (still not fully root-caused) timeout cost 31+ minutes of CPU before this was caught. Reduced to 1M and added a log line naming the failing sector, turning a silent, effectively-unbounded stall into a fast, loud failure -- callers already tolerate BLKIO_EIO. - src/starkernel/repl.c: blk_migration_idle_check() deferred for any idle tick where a storage-attach message round-trip is still pending, to keep the two block-subsystem-touching paths from interleaving; the existing MSG-TICK pump now checks the target VM's own dictionary for MSG-TICK (vm_find_word + acl_allow) before VM-EXECing into it, instead of spamming "VM-EXEC: ERROR" every tick for a VM that doesn't have -- or isn't allowed -- the word (e.g. a FORTH-79/83-locked-down identity); fixed a real -Wunused-variable build break in the EMERGENCY_CONSOLE_ ENABLED=1 path (unused today, but needed live to reproduce this bug with no identity attached at all). - src/starkernel/capsule/capsule_mint.c: dropped the dead S" common:messaging.4th" EXEC / MSG-CD-INIT lines from MINT_RESTRICTED_PERSONALITY -- a FORTH-79/83-locked-down identity has no legitimate use for a messaging vocabulary it can never call. Status: the pathological CPU-climbing scan is confirmed fixed (verified live: CPU stays flat across an extended run instead of climbing without bound). The WIREBIND storage-attach message round-trip still does not complete promptly in the "Zuse never attached, other identity attaches first" scenario -- a separate, still-open issue in the message-delivery path itself, not the scan. Tracked as follow-on work. Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com> Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_014Ec88YKxxhZGG1RNnune78
LithosAnanke v2.0.1
UEFI-bootable FORTH microkernel. Boots from firmware, initialises memory and interrupts, then runs the StarForth VM as its sole userspace runtime. No libc. No OS. Just stone and necessity.
Lithos (foundation) + Ananke (necessity) — the kernel under StarshipOS.
Status — M7.1 (Capsule System · Multi-VM Fleet)
| Milestone | Status | |
|---|---|---|
| M0–M6 | UEFI boot · PMM · VMM · IDT · APIC · heap · framebuffer VT100 console (v1.5.1-FINAL) | ✅ Complete |
| M7 | StarForth VM integration + parity validation | ✅ Complete |
| M7.1 | Capsule birth protocol · Mama FORTH vocabulary · Tripod multi-VM fleet (Hermes/Artemis) · Word-level ACL (Phases 1–7) | 🔄 In Progress |
| M8 | REPL — keyboard input, interactive Forth | Planned |
| M9 | Block storage — AHCI driver | Planned |
POST at boot: parity hash verified across amd64/aarch64/riscv64 · Mama capsule dictionary: 453 words
What's live in M7.1
- Tripod — a named multi-VM fleet (Hera the Mama VM, Artemis, two Hermes instances) births, runs, and re-births independently, verified booting live pre-REPL on all three architectures.
- Hermes — a 17-block inter-VM messaging/channel layer between fleet members, with async delivery and channel negotiation.
- Artemis — a Block Allocation Map (BAM) storage subsystem with Q48.16
block-heat tracking and cooldown/reclamation (
ART-COOL/ART-REAP). - Word-level ACL — every dictionary entry carries a TTL/allow/mode/pin
access-control record. Strict, TTL, and pinned modes; two console layers
(emergency
ok>and superuserzuse)ok>). Phases 1–7 complete (C infrastructure, FORTH policy layer,zusebootstrap superuser, Isabelle proof stubs, kernel parity); Phase 8 (Ed25519 PKI / thumbdrive challenge-response) is the only item remaining. Measured overhead once active on every check: +0.0054%–+0.0088%, CV = 0.000%, across a 3×3 Latin-square DoE campaign (architecture × seed × 30 replicates) — three orders of magnitude below the measurement floor. - VM Fleet Attractor physics — the L8 Jacquard mode selector now has a real per-VM heat channel into fleet-wide tuning, replacing hardcoded compudynamics constants with a dynamically-inferred rate.
- Kconfig build configuration — every physics/heartbeat/pipelining/ kernel-only tuning knob (~40 total) is now a discoverable, optional Kconfig symbol shared with the hosted VM build. See Quick Start below.
Quick Start
# Build kernel (requires cross-compilation toolchain, or native gcc)
make -f Makefile.starkernel ARCH=amd64
# Run in QEMU with OVMF
make -f Makefile.starkernel qemu
# Other architectures
make -f Makefile.starkernel ARCH=aarch64 qemu
make -f Makefile.starkernel ARCH=riscv64 qemu
Artifacts: build/amd64/kernel/starkernel_loader.efi · build/amd64/kernel/starkernel_kernel.elf
For the hosted VM by itself (Linux, no cross-compiler needed, no bare-metal tooling): see
the separate StarForth repository — LithosAnanke used to be a branch inside that repo,
now it's its own project with its own master.
Build configuration (optional)
Every kernel-only knob (STARFORTH_ENABLE_VM, PARITY_MODE, the shared
physics/heartbeat family, etc.) is an optional Kconfig symbol — a plain
make -f Makefile.starkernel uses the same defaults it always has unless
you opt in:
make -f Makefile.starkernel ARCH=amd64 menuconfig
make -f Makefile.starkernel ARCH=amd64 kernel_amd64_defconfig
Documentation
| System Architecture | Full kernel + VM design |
| HAL Reference | Hardware abstraction layer interfaces |
| Capsule System — M7.1 | Capsule birth protocol design |
| VM Fleet Attractor design log | Tripod/Hermes/Artemis physics + build-system history |
| Getting Started / Kconfig reference | Full symbol reference for both build targets |
| Changelog | Milestone-level history |
| Roadmap | Milestone plan through self-hosting |
License
Starship License 1.0 (SL-1.0) — free for personal, research, and educational use. Commercial use requires a separate agreement. Attribution to R.A. James (Captain Bob) must be preserved in all distributions.
Patent pending. USPTO provisional filed December 2025 — physics-grounded self-adaptive runtime system. This license does not grant patent rights. Licensing inquiries: rajames440@gmail.com
Robert A. James (Captain Bob) · Systems Engineer · Hacking since 1973