The compositor now survives the virtio-gpu driver dying and re-attaches when device-manager
restarts it — the last piece of display v2.
Three parts:
- The driver hellos the device manager (role: bus). It never did, so the manager — which
spawns it supervised and expects a hello — was stopping it at the 3s hello deadline every
run (the gate markers just printed first). Now it is properly supervised: not stopped for
silence, and restarted on death.
- A kernel IPC fix so a call to a dead service errors instead of hanging. An endpoint records
its owner; when that task dies, its registered endpoints are marked dead (and any parked
senders woken with -EPEER), so ipc_call returns -EPEER rather than blocking on a reply that
will never come. Without this the compositor's first present after the driver died blocked
forever. General robustness — any client of any service benefits.
- The compositor re-attaches. Its .scanout calls now fail cleanly (caught), freezing the last
frame; when the restarted driver re-announces, attach_scanout detects the backend is already
virtio and logs "scanout re-attached", mapping the fresh shared surface and re-looking-up
.scanout. (The previous shm mapping leaks — no shm_unmap syscall yet — but its frames are the
dead driver's, reclaimed on exit.)
- device-manager gains a "test-scanout-restart" mode (like test-usb-restart) that kills the
virtio-gpu driver once after it hellos; the displayReattachTest kernel scenario drives it.
Gate: python3 test/qemu_test.py display-reattach — "scanout upgraded to virtio-gpu" then
"scanout re-attached", no CPU exception, passing 3/3. host tests, ipc/ipc-call/ipc-cap,
supervision, shm, display-service, display-demo, virtio-gpu, display-native, and
display-modeset all pass; default zig build clean. v2 (V1-V6) complete.
Generalize capability passing from endpoints to memory objects. The per-task
handle table now holds kind-tagged entries (scheduler.HandleObject{kind, ptr});
closeHandles and shareCapability dispatch by kind, so a shared-memory object
rides an ipc_call send_cap exactly like an endpoint and is refcount-freed only
when its last capability drops.
- shm_create(len) -> vaddr, handle: contiguous, zeroed, cacheable frames wrapped
in a refcounted ShmObject, mapped into the caller's shm arena (PML4[230]).
- shm_map(cap) -> vaddr: map the same physical pages into a receiver that got the
capability. mapUserSharedInto maps WB-cacheable + device_grant, so a sharer's
teardown never frees the shared frames — the object owns them.
- runtime.shm: create(len) -> Region{ptr, handle, len}, map(handle) -> ptr.
Gate: qemu_test.py shm — shm-client creates a region, writes a pattern, passes
its capability to shm-server, which maps it and reads the same bytes back
(shm: shared 4096 bytes ok). ipc/ipc-call/ipc-cap/supervision/dma/usermem/
display-service and host tests all still pass — the handle change broke no IPC.
Add a FAT12/16/32 filesystem the VFS mounts at /mnt/usb, reading and writing a
USB stick through the block device. Verified end to end under QEMU: the fat
server mounts the volume, the VFS routes /mnt/usb to it, and a client lists the
root and reads a file (the ELF magic of /mnt/usb/system/kernel).
- engine.zig: the FAT engine over a BlockDevice interface — mount (a bare FAT or,
as QEMU's VVFAT and most real sticks present it, an MBR-partitioned disk), FAT
chain walk (12/16/32), cluster allocation, directory traversal with long-name
read, and file read / write / create. Host-tested against a RAM-backed FAT16
image (create, cluster-spanning write, mid-file overwrite, read-back, list).
- on-disk.zig: the align(1) boot-sector / directory / long-name / FSInfo structs
and the cluster-count FAT-type detection.
- fat.zig: the server — wraps the .block device (a DMA bounce buffer) in a
BlockDevice, mounts the FAT, serves the vfs-protocol as a backend, and mounts
itself into the VFS at /mnt/usb. Spawned by init as a boot service.
- runtime.block: the block-device client (geometry / read / write by physical
address, so whole sectors never cross IPC).
- Raise the kernel service-name registry (maximum_services) 8 -> 16: it is
indexed directly by ServiceId, and fat = 8 was being rejected, so the fat
server exited before registering.
- VFS: an absolute path with no matching mount is now not-found rather than
silently created in the flat ramfs — so /mnt/usb fails cleanly until mounted.
Tests: fat-mount (the full stack: block -> FAT -> VFS mount -> list + file read)
passes; host units cover the engine and on-disk structs; the vfs, shutdown, and
USB regression suite stays green (10/10).
Programs can now subscribe to keyboard events (key_down/key_up/key_press)
and drivers can broadcast them, through a new user-space input service.
The delivery model is forced by danos IPC: a synchronous rendezvous holds
one pending reply, so a server cannot park N subscribers blocked in a
"wait for next event" call — delivery must be push. But a synchronous push
has no timeout and the kernel never wakes a sender parked on a dead peer's
endpoint, so one dying subscriber would hang all input. So this lands the
roadmap's planned asynchronous buffered send and builds the service on it:
- ipc_send (syscall 26): non-blocking post to an endpoint's bounded payload
ring, delivered through reply_wait as a buffered message (notify_message_bit).
A full ring drops the oldest. It can never hang on a dead/slow peer.
- input-protocol + runtime.input helpers (subscribe/next, connectSource/
publish) — the first real consumer of M13 capability passing: a subscriber
hands the service its own endpoint as a capability.
- input service (fan-out via ipc_send, dead-subscriber pruning), a synthetic
input-source, and input-test; the ps2-bus keyboard driver publishes to it.
Real IRQ1 scancode decoding (which must live in the bus, the PNP0303 owner)
is a documented follow-up; the source is synthetic for now.
- build/init wiring, an `input` QEMU case, and docs/input.md.
Full QEMU suite 48/48, including the new input case and every IPC/endpoint
regression (ipc, ipc-call, ipc-cap, vfs, hpet, bus, irqfree).
process_enumerate snapshots the task table (the device_enumerate shape, so
ps is a user program); system_spawn returns the child id, records the caller
as supervisor, and takes an exit endpoint; process_kill is allowed only for
the supervisor. Every death — exit, fault, or kill — posts a child-exit badge
to that endpoint (the IRQ-as-IPC pattern as SIGCHLD). A target caught off-CPU
is reaped in place; a running one is condemned and finished at its next
system call or tick, guarded so teardown never lands mid-kernel-operation.
Tested by process-list, process-kill, and supervision (a ring-3 supervisor
exercising the whole surface); design notes in docs/process-management.md.
A CPU exception raised in ring 3 by a scheduled process now kills that
process - IRQ bindings, IPC handles, and address space reclaimed, a
client it owed a reply to failed with the new -EPEER instead of hung -
and the core reschedules (docs/resilience.md step 2). Kernel-mode
faults, NMI, double fault, and machine check stay terminal, as does the
borrowed-thread isolation probe. Proven by the new fault-recovery QEMU
test: init keeps heartbeating after a process page-faults to death.
ipc_call and ipc_reply_wait grow a `send_cap` argument (r9) and a `received_cap`
return (r8): an endpoint travels alongside a message, installed into the receiver's
handle table. The transfer is a share, not a move — the endpoint's refcount is bumped
and the sender keeps its handle. If the receiver's table is full the call fails
-ENOSPC and the message is NOT delivered (a half-delivered capability is worse than a
failed send); a bad handle fails -EBADF. Both directions carry a cap: a client's call
hands one to the server (seen in the server's replyWait), and the server's reply hands
one back (seen in the client's call return).
This is the "open" primitive the driver model was blocked on: a bus driver mints a
per-device endpoint and hands it to a class driver, giving it a private channel to one
device without the 8-slot global name registry.
Kernel: shareCapability in ipc-synchronous.zig at both copy points; new
setSystemCallResult3 (r8, saved/restored by the syscall stub); Task gains
ipc_send_cap / ipc_received_cap. Runtime: callCap + Reply, replyWait gains send_cap
and Received.cap; plain call/replyWait delegate with no_cap. New abi.no_cap.
New ipc-cap test (two kernel tasks exercise both directions, each verifying the
endpoint it received is the same object shared, refcount bumped to 2). No class driver
consumes callCap yet — it lands with the first one. Suite 37/37 plus host tests.
The `system` module (formerly `danos`) had become a grab-bag: it held the
loader<->kernel handoff *and* the kernel<->user ABI *and* the device wire types, in
one module three different audiences imported. Usage proved the seam — the
bootloader never touched the syscall/device ABI, and user space never touched the
boot handoff — so split it by audience, one module per contract:
system/boot-handoff.zig loader <-> kernel: BootInformation, Framebuffer,
MemoryMap, the VM layout + physicalToVirtual, kernel_abi
system/abi.zig kernel <-> user, core: SystemCall, mmap prot flags,
page_size, notify_badge_bit, ServiceId
system/devices/device-abi.zig kernel <-> user, devices: DeviceDescriptor,
DeviceClass, ResourceDescriptor, ResourceKind, ...
device-abi is the devices sub-project's public interface, exposed as its own module
the way vfs exposes vfs-protocol — importable by user space, unlike the
kernel-internal device model it also feeds. That collapses a real duplication:
DeviceClass and ResourceKind were defined twice (device-model.zig and the contract,
kept "in sync by hand"); device-model now re-exports them from device-abi, so the
enum a driver matches on and the one the kernel classifies with are one type.
Each import now declares which contract it speaks: the bootloader imports only
boot-handoff; a driver only abi + device-abi (via the runtime); the kernel all
three. This also retires the `system` / `runtime.system` name overlap. page_size
lands in abi (it's part of the mmap contract user space aligns to); the bootloader
keeps its own local 4 KiB constant so it depends on nothing but the handoff.
All 21 importers rewired, docs updated to keep /system mapping to source. Build,
host tests, and the QEMU suite (36/36) all green.
The shared kernel<->user ABI contract (BootInformation, the SystemCall numbers,
DeviceDescriptor, page_size, ...) is now the `system` module at
system/system.zig, following the convention that a directory's root file takes
the directory's name.
One overlap to note: the runtime's syscall wrappers are already `runtime.system`,
so the single file that uses both the contract and those wrappers
(library/runtime/heap.zig) aliases the wrappers locally as `system_calls`. The
two are distinct (top-level `system` vs `runtime.system`); everywhere else the
contract is just `system`.
Also: the QEMU run's serial capture now lands in the FHS log location,
zig-out/var/log/system/serial0-<timestamp>.log — a stand-in for the kernel's own
logging system, which will eventually write there itself.
Suite 35/35 plus host tests green.
The source layout now mirrors the runtime filesystem hierarchy
(docs/danos-file-system-hierarchy-FSH.md): what lives under system/ in the
source is what a running danos represents under /system. Each service and
driver is a sub-project directory that is its own Zig module — cross-project
references go by module name, never by a path into another project's files.
Moves (all git mv, history preserved):
- src/ -> system/ (danos internals; the self-representation)
root.zig -> danos.zig (the kernel<->user contract module)
kernel/arch/ -> kernel/architecture/ (arch -> architecture)
device/ -> devices/ (what /system/devices reflects)
boot/ -> /boot (the loaders, top level)
- sbin/ -> split by role:
init, vfs -> system/services/<name>/<name>.zig
hpetd, busd -> system/drivers/<name>/<name>.zig
vfs-test -> system/services/vfs/vfs-test.zig (inside the vfs project)
- lib/ -> library/runtime/ (room for other libraries beside runtime)
The VFS wire protocol becomes its own module, system/services/vfs/protocol.zig
("vfs-protocol"): the vfs sub-project exposes its interface, and the runtime's
file layer imports it by name. First instance of the "protocol module" pattern
(docs/driver-model.md); usb/block will expose theirs the same way.
Also: fix a naming-standard violation in the protocol — Op -> Operation (and
req -> request, _pad -> _padding). Docs updated: /system/services added to the
FHS doc, a repository-layout section added to the docs index, and stale source
paths swept across comments and docs.
Runtime boot paths are unchanged (the bootloader still loads /sbin/init);
aligning the runtime filesystem to the FHS is a separate follow-up. Suite 35/35
plus host tests green.
Daniel Samson