Physical verbose minimal trial, 2026-10-02

This is a physical boot observation on the corrected Linux 7.3-rc5 bundle, using controller revision f463e88d1622f75a41fb45a55f34570d582a8407. It did not reach the diagnostic receipt and did not request a candidate reboot. Shutdown, callback execution and automatic normal return remain UNVERIFIED. The 180-second return deadline never started.

The protected normal preflight passed before loading the candidate. All five U-Boot loads passed their count/CRC checks, and the volatile bootargs matched. Linux 7.3 started. The reset-controller probe returned 0; its pinned probe returns the managed restart-registration status, supporting registration in this boot, but not callback execution. The private capture ends during boot initcall output at uptime 4.036685. No shell-init, receipt, true, or candidate reboot marker was captured. All 624 observed initcall entries have matching returns. That does not establish completion of later initialization.

The controller begins eight one-second receipt attempts at the early Linux banner. About 100 KiB of candidate output requires over eight seconds at 115200 8N1, so the receipt window is inadequate for this verbose boot. The uncapped raw log is 130,995 bytes, below the 131,072-byte parser buffer limit; there is no evidence that a hidden receipt was discarded. A subsequent 15-second receive-only capture and a separate 90-second receive-only capture both obtained zero bytes. No extra diagnostic input, exit or reboot was sent. This does not distinguish a later kernel stall from console loss or another boot problem.

A root-owned webcam recording and a fresh still were reviewed before requesting operator recovery. The panel photograph shows boot text rather than normal Home. The panel is angled and reflective; the photograph cannot establish the exact final serial line. No real-finger acceptance was performed. Camera provenance records the source and crop.

Invocation

The private directory is mode 0700 and logs/configuration mode 0600. Raw UART and the full camera recording remain outside Git. The root operator held the board/serial reservation and separately recorded the webcam under its lock. No persistent boot selection, default profile, or flashed image was changed.

python3 tools/mainline-drm-initrd-shell-trial.py \
  --mode minimal --debug-shutdown \
  --bundle /nix/store/asj7l4zj5jrjkgng4nrcx3y72p7jf7aa-k230-mainline-drm-trial-boot-files \
  --manifest "$HOME/tmp/k230-mainline-restart-board/candidate-manifest.json" \
  --normal-report "$HOME/tmp/k230-mainline-restart-board/normal-report.json" \
  --log "$HOME/tmp/k230-mainline-restart-board/shutdown-debug-uart.log" \
  --result "$HOME/tmp/k230-mainline-restart-board/shutdown-debug-result.json"

Exit status was 1: initrd minimal protocol did not complete at reception. The current minimal-mode failure path did not write the result JSON; the coordinator’s observation record preserves that limitation, controller identity, exact artifacts, preflight and raw-capture hash. The console excerpt is a curated subset, not the raw log.

Recovery and next gate

The user subsequently reported a power cycle. Independent physical serial postflight passed with a new boot ID, exact normal system/profile/kernel, three active services and eight unchanged protected boot hashes. The reviewed camera Home was obtained after postflight and an IPC Home command; provenance records its source/time/filter. This is manual recovery, not automatic mainline restart or new real-finger acceptance. The earlier trial’s recovered Home was not reused. Do not send commands into an unidentified initrd/PID-1 shell.

Correct the debug readiness gate before another trial: observe the exact late shell-init marker within a bounded wait before attempting receipts, and write a structured recovery-required result if readiness/receipt fails. Then require actual candidate reboot and fresh normal identities before proceeding to the root-label/read-only-mount diagnostics. See the shutdown source audit for the limits of interpreting device-shutdown traces. Tasks 5d.4 and 5b.5 remain open.