# LithosAnanke v4.0.0-alpha.3 **UEFI-bootable FORTH microkernel.** Boots from firmware, initialises memory and interrupts, then runs StarForth as its sole userspace runtime. No libc. No OS. Just stone and necessity. *Lithos* (foundation) + *Ananke* (necessity) — the kernel under StarshipOS. **Try it in your browser:** [starshipos-f18.com](https://starshipos-f18.com/) — a StarshipOS machine of your own, booted to `[zuse@Hera] ok>`, thrown away when you leave. **Releases:** [v4.0.0-alpha.3](https://gitea.starshipos-f18.org/rajames/LithosAnanke/releases) (pre-release), the kernel `4.0.0-alpha.3` with the StarForth engine `3.2.0`. --- ## Products StarForth v4 moves the engine onto a 32-instruction core derived from Chuck Moore's F18 (`docs/v4.0.0/`). With it, this repository carries three products, not one: | Product | What it is | |---|---| | **Hosted StarForth F18** | The v4 engine as a native Linux build, for amd64, arm64 and riscv64. | | **FPGA StarForth F18** | A 32-bit build of the same engine loaded into the FPGA: the gateway to the rest, the foundation everything else is built up from. | | **StarshipOS** | The bare-metal product: LithosAnanke running StarForth. | FORTH-79 is recomposed on the F18 engine and stored as a capsule; the StarshipOS-specific vocabulary gets the same treatment. v3 remains the reference system until v4 meets its acceptance criteria (`docs/v4.0.0/JUSTIFICATION.md` §16). **Both run on bare metal now:** every board image carries v4 and v3, boots v4 as built, and one word in its boot configuration chooses (see below) — except the PC stick, which is v4 only. **v3 is being retired** (its own milestone, #156): what v4 needs of it, the block layer, moves into v4 and the rest is removed. --- ## Status | Milestone | | Status | |---|---|---| | M0–M6 | UEFI boot · PMM · VMM · IDT · APIC · heap · framebuffer VT100 console | ✅ Complete | | M7 | StarForth VM integration + parity validation | ✅ Complete | | M7.1 | Capsule birth · Mama FORTH vocabulary · the Tripod fleet · kernel-Hermes · word-level ACL | ✅ Live | | M8 | Keyboard input to the REPL — PS/2, virtio and **USB** keyboards (a full keyboard: Caps/Num Lock, keypad) | ✅ In QEMU, all three ISAs | | M9 | Block storage — on v4, Artemis and Zuse's identity on the StarshipOS stick (GPT partitions, over USB mass storage); v3's Artemis on virtio-blk | ✅ In QEMU · real disks: no driver yet (`boards/BRINGUP.md` A4) | | The stick | One USB stick is the whole OS: plug it in, boot, `[zuse@Hera] ok>` — its first boot mints its own Zuse and grows Artemis to fill it (`docs/v4.0.0/STICK.md`, #92) | ✅ Tasks 1–3 of 5 in QEMU · the real Zuse on a second stick next | | Bare metal | a generic PC (amd64; first on the bench: a Beelink SER5), Raspberry Pi 5 (aarch64), Milk-V Mars (riscv64); Zynq-7020 (ARMv7) not yet ported | Images build; first boots on the bench — `boards/BRINGUP.md` | **v4 is the default build, and v3 is being retired**: every kernel boots v4 unless its boot arguments say `system=v3`. POST at boot, on all three ISAs: v4 — **538 tests**, `PARITY:V4_SYSTEM word_count=317 dict_hash=0xfec8c47cfc6f437f`; v3 — **1052 tests**, `PARITY:M7.1a word_count=526 hash=0x82f4ae7cb2e2d424`. **How a change gets in** (the Captain Bob method): `master` is reached only through a pull request that passed **acceptance** — amd64, aarch64 and riscv64 booted in QEMU to `[zuse@Hera] ok>`, POST 538/538 and one `dict_hash` on all three; the PC stick booted loaded above 2 GiB, as a PC's firmware loads it; and the 32-bit build's tests. Every acceptance boot starts from a fresh stick, so every run is a first boot. The same stages run nightly and for every release (`scripts/nightly.sh`); the serial logs are committed. ### What's live - **The Tripod** — a named multi-VM fleet: **Hera** (the Mama VM, the governor), **Artemis** (block storage: a Block Allocation Map with Q48.16 block heat, cooldown and reclamation) and **Hestia**, birthed, run and re-birthed independently on all three architectures. - **kernel-Hermes** — messaging moved into the kernel (the Hermes VM is gone, `docs/fabric/FABRIC-3.5.md`): every VM takes its own messages on its own turn, under a cooperative switcher that every VM takes part in. - **The plug-and-play stick** (v4) — `make boot_image TARGET=PC` and `make write_stick DEVICE=/dev/sdX`, plug it in, boot: the stick's first boot mints its own Zuse (no two sticks share one) and grows its Artemis partition to fill the stick, up to 256 GiB, writing metadata only. - **Identities on thumbdrives** — Zuse, the superuser, and every user is a minted USB thumbdrive (Ed25519, Zuse-signed); plugging one in births that user's VMs, pulling it out ends them. There is only the drive: no password, no PIN. - **Signed capsules** — the capsules the kernel boots from are signed under the StarshipOS Root CA (`ci/pki/starshipos-root-ca.pem`, published with every release) and checked at boot. - **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 superuser `zuse)ok>`). Measured overhead of the live ACL-TTL mechanism: **+0.0603%**, CV 0.000%, architecture-independent (`docs/fabric/FABRIC-1.md` §T). - **Logs that persist** — every VM's log records go to a ring on Artemis's disk (`LOG-FLUSH`, `LOG-SHOW`). - **The physics-driven runtime** — seven feedback loops and the L8 Jacquard mode selector, with a per-VM heat channel into fleet-wide tuning (VM Fleet Attractor). - **Kconfig build configuration** — about 40 physics, heartbeat, pipelining and kernel-only knobs, shared with the hosted build. --- ## Quick Start ```bash # One boot image per physical target (output: build/boards//) make boot_image TARGET=PC # any x86-64 UEFI PC -- GPT/ESP, BOOTX64.EFI make boot_image TARGET=RASPI # Raspberry Pi 5 -- FAT, config.txt + kernel_2712.img + DTB make boot_image TARGET=MILKV # Milk-V Mars -- GPT/ESP, BOOTRISCV64.EFI (U-Boot bootefi) make boards # list boards (the Zynq-7020 has no ARMv7 port yet) # Each image carries v4 and v3. As built it boots v4; to boot v3, change the one word # system=v4 -> system=v3 # in starforth.cfg on the PC's stick or the Mars's card, or cmdline.txt on the Pi 5's card. # The same TARGET drives all, docs and clean (make help) make # every board with a kernel port + hosted v3 + the book make docs # build/docs/LithosAnanke.pdf (LaTeX master: docs/book/main.tex) make clean TARGET=RASPI # that board's outputs and build/aarch64/kernel # The PC stick, written to a real USB stick (checks the device, asks you to type its name back, # verifies the write); then boot it from the PC's firmware boot menu make write_stick DEVICE=/dev/sdX # The kernel in QEMU (OVMF / AAVMF / EDK2), one architecture at a time -- boots v4 from a fresh # data stick, so every boot is a stick's first boot make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=amd64 clean qemu make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=aarch64 clean qemu make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=riscv64 clean qemu make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=amd64 clean qemu-stick-high # the PC stick itself, loaded high make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=amd64 KERNEL_ARGS=system=v3 clean qemu # v3, while it remains # The Pi 5's native boot path, rehearsed on QEMU's virt machine at EL2 make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=aarch64 RPI5_NATIVE_BASE=0x40080000 rpi5-rehearsal ``` Artifacts: `build//kernel/starkernel_loader.efi` · `build//kernel/starkernel_kernel.elf` Tree: `kernel/` (LithosAnanke: `Makefile`, `src/`, `include/starkernel/`, `linker/`), `v3/` (StarForth v3 engine and hosted build), `v4/` (StarForth v4, see `docs/v4.0.0/`), `boards//` (`board.mk` + boot files), `capsules/` (the FORTH capsules). Every makefile runs from the repo root; the root `Makefile` forwards any other goal to `v3/Makefile`. For the hosted v3 VM by itself, see the separate **StarForth** repository — LithosAnanke used to be a branch inside it, and is now its own project. ### Build configuration (optional) Every kernel-only knob is an optional Kconfig symbol; a plain `make -f kernel/Makefile` uses the defaults unless you opt in: ```bash make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=amd64 menuconfig make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=amd64 kernel_amd64_defconfig ``` --- ## Documentation **Start at [docs/README.md](docs/README.md)** — the map: where each kind of document lives and which to believe. Among them: | | | |---|---| | [The FABRIC record](docs/fabric/) | Every design decision and the work as it happened (`FABRIC-3.md` is the living one) — published as *The Book of Fabric* from alpha.4 | | [The stick](docs/v4.0.0/STICK.md) | The x86-64 StarshipOS stick: plug and play, the proxy Zuse, growth | | [StarForth v4](docs/v4.0.0/) | The F18-derived engine | | [Board bring-up](boards/BRINGUP.md) | Getting onto a PC, the Pi 5 and the Mars | | [Roadmap and versioning](docs/reference/ROADMAP.md) | Milestone plan and release-versioning policy | | [Capsule System — M7.1](docs/reference/M7.1.md) | Capsule birth protocol | | [Word-level ACL](docs/reference/word-acl/DESIGN.md) | The access-control design | | [HAL, as built](kernel/src/hal/README.md) | Hardware abstraction layer | | [Developer guide / Kconfig reference](docs/working/architecture/getting-started/DEVELOPER.md#build-configuration-kconfig) | Full symbol reference for both builds | | [Dead ideas and revised claims](docs/DEAD-AND-REVISED.md) | What is no longer true, and since when | | [Changelog](CHANGELOG.md) | Milestone-level history | --- ## License [Starship License 1.0 (SL-1.0)](LICENSE) — 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*