Robert Allan James
ff67bbdec3
SSDSCOPE and ROUNDTRIP close by cross-referencing decisions already made this session (D.3's "no central registry" statement, and the pool-ownership/EJECT-flush model from F.6/F.10) rather than new tracing -- both turn out to have zero remaining work of their own. POLYBLOCK needed the user's own clarification first (never elaborated beyond one sentence since 2026-08-25): reframes as an architectural principle (the block layer shouldn't know what backs it), confirmed already true of blk_get_buffer()'s live RAM/raw/disk-cache abstraction. PROMPTBUG traced for the literal string and found to be less than described -- no live code prints "zuse)ok>" today, only a doc comment describing not-yet-implemented behavior; correct intended form recorded, comment itself not touched per standing instruction against unrequested code changes. Also corrects two stale graph classifications noticed while cleaning up: ACLKEY's own node had never been updated despite being fully scoped back in F.2, and the empty "open" classDef bucket is now removed since every §E node is closed or scoped except WRITE(10) itself.
LithosAnanke v1.5.4
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