docs(outreach): drafts of a sponsorship page, devlog #1 and video #1

For Captain Bob to edit into his own voice: the sponsorship pitch and tiers, the first devlog
('Building an OS that keeps its own receipts'), and a 5-7 minute video script with an OBS setup.
Claims limited to what is true today: QEMU on three ISAs, the stick in progress, hardware next.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
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rajames
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co-authored by Claude Opus 5.5
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# Devlog #1: Building an OS that keeps its own receipts
*Draft (2026-10-28). Captain Bob to edit into his own voice before posting.*
---
I spent a good part of my career validating software for regulated industries. If you've done that
work, you know what it's like: a big commercial system, a stack of virtualisation and Windows
under it, and months spent producing screenshots and signed test scripts to prove it does what
the vendor says. The evidence never existed from the start; you dig it up afterwards.
So I started building an operating system where the evidence comes first.
## What StarshipOS is
StarshipOS boots straight from a PC's UEFI firmware. There's no Linux and no libc underneath: the
kernel, LithosAnanke, sets up memory, interrupts and devices itself, then hands the machine to
**StarForth v4**, a FORTH engine modelled on Chuck Moore's F18, the tiny stack-machine core of the
GreenArrays chips.
FORTH might seem an odd choice in 2026. But a stack machine is small enough to understand
completely, and small enough to *prove* things about. That's the point.
## Evidence at every boot
Every time StarshipOS starts, it does three things before it shows a prompt:
1. **It tests itself.** 538 power-on self-tests cover the engine and its FORTH-79 vocabulary.
2. **It fingerprints itself.** Every piece of software is a *capsule* identified by the hash of its
contents, and the system prints a hash of its whole dictionary. On x86-64, ARM64 and RISC-V,
that hash is identical: `0xfec8c47cfc6f437f`. Three different CPUs, one system, provably the same.
3. **It waits for its owner.** Without the owner's identity stick plugged in, there's no prompt at
all. With it, you're greeted by name: `[zuse@Hera] ok>`.
## How it gets built
The development method matters as much as the code. Every change starts with a test that fails.
Every decision that deviates from the plan is written down with its reason. And every claim of
"it works" is backed by a boot log that's committed to the repository, never just summarised.
Just this week, that habit caught a regression within the hour. A change that put the owner's
identity on a single USB stick quietly broke the older v3 system's login: v3 can't read the stick's
partition table. The next day's tests found it, it was fixed, and the fix is on the record.
## What's next
- **This week:** the USB stick that boots a real PC, carrying the whole system and its owner's
identity on one drive.
- **Then:** the first boot on real hardware, a small x86 mini PC on my bench.
- **November:** the engine onto an FPGA board, the first step toward proven cores in silicon.
- **Later:** an SDK where every program is a "book": plain-English pages saying what it does, the
code, the tests, and the proofs, side by side, with each claim marked *stated*, *tested* or
*proven*.
If you'd like to follow along or help keep the lights on, there's a sponsorship page *[link]*.
Next devlog: the first boot on real metal, whichever way it goes.
— Captain Bob
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# Sponsor StarshipOS
*Draft for Ko-fi, Patreon, Open Collective or GitHub Sponsors (2026-10-28). Captain Bob to edit
into his own voice before posting.*
---
## An operating system that can prove what it is
I'm Bob James. I spent years in industry validating software: proving to auditors that a system
does what it says. Most of that work was reconstructing evidence that should have existed from
day one. So I'm building the system I always wanted to validate.
**StarshipOS** is a bare-metal operating system built on FORTH. It boots straight from UEFI
firmware, without Linux or any OS under it, and runs **StarForth v4**, a small stack-machine engine
inspired by Chuck Moore's F18 chip. Every piece of it is built to carry its own evidence:
- **Every component has a fingerprint.** Software ships in *capsules*, identified by the hash of
their content. The running system prints those hashes at every boot, so "is this the system that
was tested?" is a check, not a belief.
- **Every boot tests itself.** 538 self-tests run before the first prompt, on three CPU
architectures (x86-64, ARM64, RISC-V), and all three must agree on the same dictionary hash.
- **Nothing runs without its owner.** No identity stick, no prompt. Access is controlled word by
word.
- **Proofs, not promises.** The design is being specified in Isabelle/HOL, a machine-checked proof
system, with every assumption named and every unproven part labelled as unproven.
## Where it is today
- Boots in emulation (QEMU) on all three architectures, passing every self-test.
- A USB stick image that boots a PC is in progress now. The first real-hardware boot, on a small
x86 PC, is next.
- After that: the engine on an FPGA (a Zynq-7020 board), with the long-term goal of proven F18-style
cores in silicon.
- The adaptive runtime underneath, the Steady State Machine, is patent pending.
## What your support does
This is a one-person project run on a retirement budget. Sponsorship pays for test hardware, cables
and boards, patent filing fees, and the hours that go into it.
## Tiers
- **Crew, $5/month:** my thanks, and the monthly devlog a few days early.
- **Officer, $15/month:** the above, plus your name in the project's credits file.
- **Bridge, $50/month:** the above, plus a monthly live Q&A call with me about the project.
*(No physical rewards yet. When the bootable stick is ready, supporters will hear about it first.)*
## Follow along
- Devlog: *[link]*
- YouTube: *[link]*
- Source: *[link to the public repository, if and when it is public]*
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# Video #1: "An OS that proves it's itself" (5-7 minutes)
*Draft script and OBS setup (2026-10-28). Captain Bob presents; speak it in your own words, the
script is a guide.*
## OBS setup
- **Scene 1, "Talking":** webcam full frame, a lower-third title: "Captain Bob · StarshipOS".
- **Scene 2, "Terminal":** a screen capture of the terminal, with the webcam as a small corner
inset. Use a large font (18-20 pt) and a dark theme so text reads on a phone.
- **Scene 3, "QEMU":** a window capture of the QEMU display, webcam inset.
- **Audio:** the microphone with OBS's noise suppression filter. Record at 1080p, 30 fps.
- **Before recording:** run one boot so the build is warm. Use `make -f kernel/Makefile ARCH=amd64
qemu` (the default disks log Zuse in), and have the aarch64 and riscv64 logs from the last
acceptance run ready to show.
## Script
**1. Hook (Talking, 0:00-0:30)**
"Most software can't prove it's the software you tested. This one checks itself every time it
boots. I'm Bob, I spent years validating enterprise software, and this is StarshipOS."
**2. What it is (Talking, 0:30-1:30)**
- Boots straight from firmware: no Linux, no libc.
- Runs FORTH, on an engine modelled on Chuck Moore's F18.
- Why a stack machine: small enough to understand completely, and to prove things about.
**3. The demo (Terminal, then QEMU, 1:30-4:00)**
- Start the boot. While it runs: "It's emulating a PC from firmware up, so give it a minute."
- Point out the POST line as it passes: `PARITY:V4_POST tests=538 pass=538 fail=0`. "538
self-tests, every boot."
- Point out `dict_hash=0xfec8c47cfc6f437f`. Then show the same line in the ARM and RISC-V logs:
"Three different CPUs. Same hash. Same system."
- The prompt appears: `[zuse@Hera] ok>`. "It greets its owner. No identity stick, no prompt."
- Type `3 4 + .` and press Enter: `7 ok`. "And it's FORTH: it adds."
**4. Why it matters (Talking, 4:00-5:15)**
- The validation story: evidence produced while building, not dug up afterwards.
- Content-hashed capsules: "Is this the approved version?" becomes a hash check.
- The plan: real PC next week, FPGA in November, proven cores in silicon as the long goal.
**5. Close (Talking, 5:15-6:00)**
"Next video: the first boot on real hardware, whichever way it goes. If you'd like to follow along
or help, links are below. Captain Bob, signing off."
## Description box
StarshipOS: a bare-metal FORTH operating system that tests and fingerprints itself on every boot.
538 self-tests; one dictionary hash across x86-64, ARM64 and RISC-V; no prompt without its owner's
identity stick. Built by Captain Bob.
Sponsor: *[link]* · Devlog: *[link]*
## Honesty checklist (before publishing)
- Say "in emulation (QEMU)" for anything not yet shown on real hardware.
- Say "patent pending" only for the filed provisional (the Steady State Machine).
- Say "being specified in Isabelle/HOL" for the proofs; the v4 proofs are not finished.