AXL / PROVENANCE / V4.0.1 FREEZE

AXL Rosetta v4.0.1 Freeze Anchor

Subject: spec/v4-kernel.md from axl-research at tag v4.0.2-r6-freeze.

Frozen: 2026-04-25. Status: research preview. v3.1 remains the productized stable grammar; v4.0.1 is the qualified successor.

This page is the provenance record for the v4.0.1 release. The v1.0.0 whitepaper is anchored separately on the main provenance page through four independent records (OpenTimestamps + Bitcoin block 941334, GitHub release v0.4.0, PyPI axl-core 0.4.0, Internet Archive). This page extends that pattern to the v4 kernel by recording the SHA-256 of the kernel spec at the freeze commit.

Freeze artifacts (byte-identical to source, OTS-stamped):

Freeze record

Source repositories

Both repos are private during the productization gate. Unauthenticated visitors will see a 404. A public mirror is planned post-gate per the cc-ops-axlserver directive sections 14-16 (productization gates and v4 isolation).

01 OpenTimestamps anchor Receipts submitted, awaiting Bitcoin block

What this anchors. The SHA-256 of spec/v4-kernel.md (and the companion v4-kernel-router.md and v4-code-layer.md) at the freeze commit, submitted to the OpenTimestamps calendar network on 2026-04-25. Once a calendar aggregates the hash into a Merkle tree and commits the tree root to a Bitcoin transaction, the block's proof-of-work retroactively pins the kernel hash to the calendar's submission timestamp.

Status. All three receipts were submitted on 2026-04-25 and currently carry PendingAttestation entries from each of the four calendars. A typical Bitcoin block confirmation cycle is 24-48 hours; once any calendar commits its merkle root, run ots upgrade to fetch the BitcoinBlockHeaderAttestation. This page will be updated with the block height when confirmation lands. The same calendar set used for the v1.0.0 whitepaper anchor (confirmed in Bitcoin block 941334) was used here for direct comparability.

Calendars this proof aggregates through (same set as v1.0.0):

• alice.btc.calendar.opentimestamps.org
• bob.btc.calendar.opentimestamps.org
• finney.calendar.eternitywall.com
• btc.calendar.catallaxy.com

OpenTimestamps receipts on this page:

Verify from source

Anyone can independently confirm the artifact hash and the OTS submission without trusting axlprotocol.org. Pick any of the three artifact / receipt pairs:

# Install the OpenTimestamps client
pip install opentimestamps-client

# Download artifact + receipt (example: kernel)
curl -O https://axlprotocol.org/timestamps/v4-kernel-v4.0.2-r6.md
curl -O https://axlprotocol.org/timestamps/v4-kernel-v4.0.2-r6.md.ots

# Confirm the hash
sha256sum v4-kernel-v4.0.2-r6.md
# Expected: ad5b251283326d8f280a54a16604dc05cba3fa7cea8b0fc956b65955651b04c7

# Inspect the receipt locally (no network required)
ots info v4-kernel-v4.0.2-r6.md.ots

# Try to upgrade the receipt: fetches BitcoinBlockHeaderAttestation if a calendar
# has committed its merkle root since submission (typically 24-48h)
ots upgrade v4-kernel-v4.0.2-r6.md.ots

# Full on-chain verification once upgraded
ots verify v4-kernel-v4.0.2-r6.md.ots

# Repeat for the other two artifacts
sha256sum v4-kernel-router-v4.0.2-r6.md
# Expected: f3247df58efbf12f236441caca5f49a71093c7bee7e12473f14975cff5a2f550
sha256sum v4-code-layer-v4.0.2-r6.md
# Expected: 3d246d51a0e6667f85639e63d2a5bf47c49bcb833e6a1430b8098b9a7d57d60f

On macOS replace sha256sum with shasum -a 256. ots info reads only the local file; ots upgrade queries the calendar servers and rewrites the receipt in place once a Bitcoin attestation is available; ots verify performs the full on-chain check (requires a Bitcoin node, or accepts --use-btc-blockchain-info via a public block explorer).

Submission record

Verify from source

Anyone with read access to the canonical or mirror repository can independently confirm the kernel SHA-256 and that the tag points at the recorded commit:

# Recompute the kernel hash from the freeze commit
git clone git@github.com:dcarranza-axl/axl-research.git
cd axl-research
git checkout v4.0.2-r6-freeze
sha256sum spec/v4-kernel.md
# Expected: ad5b251283326d8f280a54a16604dc05cba3fa7cea8b0fc956b65955651b04c7

# Confirm the tag points at the recorded commit
git rev-list -n 1 v4.0.2-r6-freeze
# Expected: 51e75de1f81fad1471a7173c6413c1bb920c559a

# Cross-check the same hash via the raw spec served from this site (strip the 6-line header)
curl -s https://axlprotocol.org/v4 | tail -n +8 | sha256sum
# Expected: ad5b251283326d8f280a54a16604dc05cba3fa7cea8b0fc956b65955651b04c7

# Sanity-check the test count at the freeze commit
pytest -q
# Expected: 217 passed in ~2.7s

On macOS replace sha256sum with shasum -a 256. The strip-header pipeline (tail -n +8) accounts for the six-line provenance comment plus its trailing blank line that this site prepends to the served raw spec; the source file in the repository is byte-identical to the result of stripping those seven lines.

What this does not yet prove

Related

• v1.0.0 whitepaper provenance (four anchors, Bitcoin-confirmed)
• /v4 raw kernel spec
• /v4-router raw spec
• /v4-code raw spec
• Frozen artifact: kernel (OTS receipt)
• Frozen artifact: kernel-router (OTS receipt)
• Frozen artifact: code-layer (OTS receipt)
• v4 hub
• v4 research status
• Research repos bridge
• /axl.txt discovery manifest