Daniel Samson
4e7cbc9792
Replaces L2's interim DMA pool (every buffer reachable by every claimed device) with true per-grant confinement: a device reaches only buffers whose capability was delegated to its driver. Kernel: - DmaRegionObject (handle kind 2): a delegation token naming a dma_alloc'd region, passable across processes on the IPC cap slot like an endpoint or shared-memory object. Frames stay owned by the allocating address space (freed on dma_free/teardown as before); the token carries a `dead` flag so a stale downstream handle can no longer bind a freed region. - dma_alloc gains the dma_shareable flag: it returns a capability handle in r8 and every region is tracked in a registry. A task's own regions auto-bind into the devices it claims (its rings just work); foreign buffers are bound explicitly. - dma_bind / dma_unbind / handle_close syscalls (51-53). dma_bind maps a held region (or shared-memory) capability into a claimed device's domain; it is idempotent. handle_close reclaims a table slot (raised 16 -> 32). - dma_free and task death unmap a region from every domain and invalidate BEFORE its frames return to the allocator — the stale-IOTLB use-after- free window, closed structurally. Protocols (flag-day): block gains attach, usb-transfer gains dma_attach — each carries a region capability on the cap slot. fat allocates its bounce buffer shareable and attaches it; usb-storage allocates its transport buffers shareable, attaches them to the controller, and forwards fat's capability downstream; usb-xhci-bus binds and closes; virtio-gpu binds its shared scanout surface. The physical addresses on the wire are unchanged (identity IOVA), so no register-programming code moved. Cross-process DMA (fat -> usb-storage -> xHC) now flows only through delegated capabilities. iommu-usb-storage / iommu-usb-hid / iommu-fault all green under per-grant enforcement; 104/104 overall (fail-open paths unchanged).
DanOS
Codename: Shodan
A very small resilient operating system.
Zen of DanOS:
- Resilient Micro-Kernel Architecture.
- Every process run in an isolated user space not kernel space.
- Processes cannot take down the entire OS with it when they die or is killed
- Stable public runtime library, private OS ABI.
- Keeps a stable runtime for user space processes between OS versions (great for backwards compatibility)
- Allows the underlying OS to be changed without effecting applications
- Provides a boundary to enable compatibility between OS's e.g. POSIX, MUSL etc
- Drivers are just isolated processes in user space.
- Thin binaries that can be restarted like applications.
- Useful during driver development.
- Drivers can claim MMIO / ports
- Driver resources (e.g. IRQ/Port/MMIO) claims are automatically cleaned up if the driver dies or is killed
- Drivers can also hook into the process lifecycle to clean up or reset hardware
- No legacy to deal with
- Zig code uses a clean coding style (Zen of Zig)
- Favor reading code over writing code.
- No magic numbers.
- No shortened names unless its for ABI compatibility or acronyms
- Inter-Process Communication (IPC)
- Publish and subscribe to Asynchronous Messages
- Talk to services and processes synchronously
Prerequisites
- Zig 0.16.x — the build is pinned to this line (
.zig-version); other minor versions are rejected, because Zig makes breaking changes between releases pre-1.0. A toolchain manager such as zvm orzigupwill pick up.zig-versionautomatically. - QEMU (
qemu-system-x86_64) — to run and test the kernel. On macOS,brew install qemualso bundles the OVMF firmware below. - OVMF UEFI firmware — the
edk2-ovmfpackage (Arch),ovmf(Debian/Ubuntu), oredk2-ovmf(Fedora); on macOS it ships inside the Homebrewqemuformula. Both the build and the test harness probe the known Arch/Debian/Fedora/macOS layouts and use the first that exists, so no configuration is normally needed. Override with-Dovmf-code=/-Dovmf-vars=(build) if yours lives elsewhere. - Python 3 — for the QEMU integration test harness.
Build
zig build
Produces a FHS-shaped zig-out/ that is the danos filesystem and the boot volume:
the UEFI bootloader at zig-out/EFI/BOOT/BOOTX64.efi, the kernel at
zig-out/system/kernel, init at zig-out/system/services/init, drivers under
zig-out/system/drivers/, the test fixtures under zig-out/test/system/services/,
and the initial-ramdisk at zig-out/boot/.
Release media
zig build release-x86-64
Produces zig-out/danos-x86-64.iso, a hybrid ISO that boots flashed raw to a
USB stick (balenaEtcher, dd) or burned to optical media — see
docs/release-iso.md. zig build check-iso-image
validates it without booting.
Run
Boot it in QEMU with OVMF (opens a display window):
zig build run-x86-64
# distro with OVMF elsewhere:
zig build run-x86-64 -Dovmf-code=/path/OVMF_CODE.fd -Dovmf-vars=/path/OVMF_VARS.fd
Test
zig build test # host unit tests (the platform-independent shared code)
python3 test/qemu_test.py # QEMU integration tests: boots the kernel and asserts
# on its serial output (see docs/testing.md)
The integration harness builds and boots the kernel once per test case, checking memory, the frame allocator, paging (incl. NX and the null guard), the heap, interrupts, and exception handling. It exits non-zero on any failure, so it drops straight into CI.
Documentation
Design notes explaining why behind the code live in
docs/ — start with docs/README.md.
For the hardware needed to run DanOS — minimum specs plus a plain-language guide
matching Intel/AMD CPU generations by name — see
docs/system-requirements.md.
Logo
San Serif Text "Dan OS" with a black karate belt around it.