The kernel masks an IRQ line when it delivers the interrupt to userspace
(trigger() -> pic_mask()/ioapic_mask()) and only re-enables it when the
driver writes the count back (kwrite -> acknowledge() -> pic_unmask()/
ioapic_unmask()). That write-back is therefore mandatory, not optional.
ahcid only performed it inside the `is > 0` branch. IRQ lines are shared
(on q35 the AHCI controller sits on IRQ 10 with other devices), so an
interrupt raised by a different device reaches the handler with the HBA
interrupt status register reading 0. In that case ahcid returned without
writing back, leaving the line masked permanently: every subsequent AHCI
completion was lost and all disk I/O blocked forever.
Move the write-back out of the branch so the line is re-armed whether or
not the interrupt turned out to be ours, and keep scheme.tick() gated on
`is > 0` since there is no completion to service otherwise. Device-level
status is still cleared before unmasking, so this cannot cause a storm.
- init: add condition_path_exists so optional-daemon units (dbus, seatd,
thermald, evdevd) are silently skipped when their binary is absent in a
minimal image, instead of emitting [FAILED] 'No such file or directory' on
the bare target. Boot-critical units omit the field and still hard-fail.
- ahcid: an empty ATAPI/optical drive (QEMU's default DVD-ROM, most bare-metal
optical bays) failed READ CAPACITY and logged 4 ERROR lines every boot;
register it with a zero block count as a normal no-media state and drop the
HBA register dump to debug level.
- netstack: a machine with no NIC (bare, or an unsupported NIC) logged an ERROR
and exited non-zero; treat 'no network adapter' as a normal idle state
(info + clean exit).
- dhcpd: cut the socket timeout 30s -> 8s so the network stage fails fast when
no DHCP server answers instead of stalling boot.
Red Bear OS