# frank-archon — Radiance (StillDeadcode), Qwen3.8-Flash-Next-FP8 NATIVE, 2× R9700 TP=2

**Status: RETIRED 2026-10-05 → 2026-10-08** — replaced by the Swift1.5 w4dn8
conversion ([[frank-archon-radiance-swift15-w4dn8]]), itself retired 2026-10-15;
the payload live today (2026-10-18) is the publisher iq4r container,
[[frank-archon-radiance-qwen38-iq4r]] (`scripts/frank-archon.env:110-111`). ·
**Host:** Dankserver (192.168.0.235) · **Port:** 7770 · **GPU:** 2× Radeon AI PRO R9700 (gfx1201), TP=2

The FreeToken PR #587 endpoint was replaced by the **radiance engine** (C++/HIP,
libr4d kernels for gfx1201, no Python in the serving path) driving the
digest-pinned image `stilldeadcode/radiance@sha256:4c3f484564bb2872784e4…`
(v1.0.7 line, 287 MiB, `libr4d@0.5.0`) as a plain `podman run` through
`scripts/serve-frank-archon.sh` under the **root systemd unit**
(`frank-archon.service`, `User=dank`, `LimitMEMLOCK=infinity`). Same port,
same served alias (`frank-archon`), same container identity
(`frank-archon` = the unit name). Rollback: git tag
`frank-archon-freetoken-pr587-20261005` (FreeToken trio + Dockerfile; the
Dockerfile lives in the tag as `scripts/docker/frank-primary-freetoken.Dockerfile`
— `scripts/docker/` is not in the tree today), image
`localhost/frank-primary-freetoken:pr587-77a7201` (that is the tag on the host —
the 2026-10-10 rename never retagged it), payload
`/home/dank/models/Qwen3.8-Flash-Next-Uncensored-FP8`, which is **no longer on
disk** (`ls /home/dank/models/` on Dankserver 2026-10-18: `StillDeadcode`, `rad`,
`tpl.jinja` only).

## Why radiance

- **TP=2 is real here.** FreeToken's TP=2 dies in the `pynccl.cu` ROCm JIT
  (`cuda_runtime.h` unresolvable for gfx1201 — probed 2026-10-06); the
  second R9700 idled. Radiance's TP wire is libr4d's own one-shot
  all-reduce (no RCCL), legal on this board since the 2026-09-20 swap
  (ProArt B850, x8/x8 on CPU root ports, `Routing+`/`ReqEn+` everywhere).
- **Native FP8 end to end** (Frank's call): the official
  `Qwen/Qwen3.8-Flash-Next-FP8` checkpoint keeps its modelopt block-FP8
  encoding — no requantisation, no calibration run, no 4-bit codebook.
- **Every tier is explicit and measured**, not an estimator: placement
  `expert_tiered` with a pinned host pool, `--ngram-placement ram` for the
  47.7 GiB PLE table, `--expert-vs-cache-ratio 0.82` (the publisher's
  measured 99 %-hit point; 0.87 already collapses to 0 %), fp8 KV.

## The payload: native FP8, reshaped then converted (one recipe rule)

- **Raw checkpoint**: `/home/dank/models/Qwen/Qwen3.8-Flash-Next-FP8`
  (ungated repo, 172.8 GB, 131 shards + index + tokenizer + vision
  configs). Fetched by `scripts/download-frank-archon.sh` (vendored
  `hfget.sh`, curl+jq, no HF token needed) and **verified byte-for-byte**:
  all 131 shards sha256-match the Hub LFS oids (2026-10-05, log
  `/home/dank/logs/verify-qwen38-official-fp8.log`).
- **The container**: `/home/dank/models/rad/qwen4exp-fp8-native.rad`
  (177,109 MiB measured = 173.0 GiB; floor
  `FRANK_ARCHON_RAD_MIN_MIB=177000` in the env gates a
  truncated convert). Built by `scripts/build-frank-archon-rad.sh`:
  1. stage `/home/dank/models/stage-qwen4exp-fp8` — `config.json` with
     **`quantization_config` dropped** + relative symlinks into the raw
     checkout;
  2. `stack-qwen38-official-fp8.py` reshapes the staging dir — two
     transforms, both value-preserving (script docstring carries the full
     argument): the plugin maps the STACKED expert layout
     (`mlp.experts.gate_up_proj` `[512,1280,2560]` + `_scale_inv` at the
     same index) while the official repo ships per-expert unfused tensors,
     so staging byte-stacks all 49 stacks' (48 trunk + MTP) 512 experts
     with NO requantisation; and the PLE table ships as 128 **scaleless**
     E4M3 shards + one bf16 scalar (1.9931793212890625e-04) while the
     plugin's fp8 branch wants the codes beside a ONE-ELEMENT bf16 scale
     plane — so staging decodes to a single bf16 `shard_0` with the
     checkpoint's own scale (e4m3 decode and the scale are both exact in
     bf16);
  3. `rad-convert` with ONE `--quant` rule — pure copy for everything else
     (every weight keeps the checkpoint's block-FP8 planes: `X.weight`
     E4M3 codes + `X.weight_scale_inv` bf16 `[128×128]` scales) — and the
     rtn rule re-encodes the bf16 PLE table at the same fixed scale, an
     exact round-trip (nearest-code distance 2⁻³ vs the bf16 rounding
     perturbation 2⁻⁹): the container gets the checkpoint's own PLE codes
     plus the one-element scale plane (`blk.1.ple_ngram.scale`, view {1});
  4. THREE LAWS the live runs proved (each cost a full verify+declare
     cycle; all fixed in the two scripts, 2026-10-05/06):
     - **Scale-name law**: `scale_name()` appends `_scale_inv` to the
       TENSOR NAME verbatim — a stacked tensor named
       `…experts.gate_up_proj` (no `.weight` suffix) has its scale plane
       at `…experts.gate_up_proj_scale_inv`, NOT `…weight_scale_inv`.
     - **File-shadow law**: the reader opens every index-named file in
       SORTED order and emplaces EVERY tensor each file physically
       holds, first-wins (`checkpoint.cpp add_shard`). The raw
       model-000NN shards carry tensors NAMED exactly what the merged
       PLE shard is named, so the merged file MUST sort first
       (`00-ple.merged.safetensors`) or a raw fp8 shard wins the name
       and the plan reads one shard as the codes.
     - **Symlink-through law**: staging symlinks the raw index into the
       stage; `open(path,"w")` writes THROUGH it and corrupts the raw
       checkpoint (raw verify then fails 143/144). The stack script
       writes index/config temp+`os.replace` — an atomic swap replaces
       the symlink itself; the build script COPIES the index and
       symlinks only the shards.
  5. `rad-info` summary + size floor.
- **Why the staging dir is mandatory** (the descriptor law, spec §2.4):
  the plugin is selected by the exact `(arch_id, quant descriptor)` pair
  with no fallback. A raw official checkpoint carries
  `quantization_config.quant_method: "fp8"` → descriptor `"fp8"` → **no
  shipped plugin claims `(qwen4exp, "fp8")`** — raw serve AND unmodified
  convert both refuse. The shipped `qwen4exp_fp8` plugin claims
  `(qwen4exp, "")` (recipe-built containers). `rad_convert.cpp` writes
  `w.set_quant(meta.quant)` into the header, so the staged config's empty
  quant method flows through as the container descriptor while **every
  weight stays FP8 data**. Native precision is untouched; only the
  selection key differs.
- `--plan-only` first: the convert's declare phase is the engine's own,
  so a plan that resolves every op will boot. The convert runs card-less
  (declare = CPU-side layout queries); add `--device` only if a plugin
  load ever demands it.

## The shape (`scripts/frank-archon.env`, every value commented there)

| Knob | Value | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Image | `stilldeadcode/radiance@sha256:4c3f4845…` | digest-pinned INDEX digest (RepoDigests also carry the per-arch manifest `1c582005…`; the image ID `69d05724…` is the config digest, NOT a manifest digest — pinning it sends `podman run` to the network); entrypoint = engine, tools (`rad-convert`/`rad-info`/`rad-tune`/`rad-kbench`) on PATH |
| Container | `frank-archon` | identity = service name across runtimes; legacy list retires `frank-archon-qwen frank-archon-r9v qwen-fp8 glm-probe` |
| `--tp 2 --tp-wire wht6` | both R9700s | fused WHT-6 lossy wire: +5.6–6.3 % prefill, ~−1.3 % 8-stream decode at TP2; `--tp-wire-min-kb` stays engine default (128 KiB) |
| `--max-num-seqs 2` | first boot | Frank: "parallelism = 2 to start". Raise only after a real-traffic look at slot occupancy + the ledger's KV headroom line. The fused all-reduce row count is `seqs × (1 + spec) = 8` |
| `--max-model-len 200000` | served window | native 262,144; the publisher's production value and what `models.yml` quotes. Longer prompt = refused, never truncated |
| `--placement expert_tiered --host-pool-mib 40960` | pinned expert pool **per rank** | native FP8 experts are 112.8 GiB total (56.4 GiB/rank slice) vs ~29 GiB at the 4-bit publisher shape — the pool is the price of native precision. Resize from the boot ledger's coverage line, never arithmetic |
| `--gpu-headroom-mib 96 --expert-vs-cache-ratio 0.82` | publisher values | 0.82 = measured 99 % expert-cache hit; 0.87 → 0 % (the cliff) |
| `--kv-cache-dtype fp8` | **7.32 KiB/token** | 12 QSA full-attention layers, 2 KV heads × 256 dim, K+V; a 200K-token sequence is 1.43 GiB. KV is sized from the VRAM the ratio leaves |
| `--num-speculative-tokens 3` | MTP head | the checkpoint carries `mtp.*` (3,101 tensors, `mtp_num_hidden_layers: 1`); the plugin's probe returns draft depth 3 — the publisher's operating point |
| `--max-num-batched-tokens 2048` | prefill chunk | A/B-verified optimum (1024/2048/4096 ladder, see "Tuning levers") |
| `--prefix-cache-host-mib 4096 --prefix-cache-dir /data/kvcache/frank-archon --prefix-cache-disk-mib 65536` | 3 tiers | host tier pinned (see the ledger), disk tier in `/home/dank/radiance-state` (mounted rw at `/data`; `/` is ext4, mapped-tier-eligible); a session snapshot moves with its blocks |
| `--ngram-placement ram` | **PLE pinned to host RAM** | Frank's pin law. The PLE n-gram table is 51.2 GB (320,001,536 rows × 160 dims = 29 % of all parameters) served via io_uring reads; `ram` **refuses the boot** if memlock is too small |
| `--override-chat-template /templates/template.jinja` | froggeric v22.5 | vendored `scripts/qwen38-froggeric-v22.5.jinja` (28,234 B, `qwen3.8-froggeric-v22.5`); rad-convert bakes the checkpoint's own template, this overrides it, and the engine derives the reasoning/tool-call reply format from it |

**Pinned-RAM ledger** (root unit + `LimitMEMLOCK=infinity` exist for this):
2 × 40 GiB expert pools + 47.7 GiB PLE + 4 GiB prefix host tier + ~2 GiB
spare ≈ **134 GiB**. `ttm.pages_limit` (this kernel has NO `pages_max` —
the two-knob story was stale) caps GPU-mappable pinned pages (default = half
of RAM): the pre-cutover cap was **123 GiB** — BELOW the ledger — so the
serve script's TTM preflight (`FRANK_ARCHON_TTM_MIN_MIB=140000`) refuses to
start until it is raised. DONE 2026-10-05 pre-cutover: sysfs write of
**52,428,800 pages = 200 GiB** (`/sys/module/ttm/parameters/pages_limit`;
verified read-back; raising at runtime is harmless and allocates nothing).
PERSISTENCE: the sysfs write does not survive reboot, and the kernel-cmdline
`ttm.pages_limit=52428800` was never added — the unit now raises the knob at
every boot instead (`scripts/frank-archon.service:44`,
`ExecStartPre=+…/scripts/ttm-preflight.sh --raise`).

**Per-rank VRAM** at TP2: expert slice 56.4 GiB total across VRAM + host
pool; trunk ~3.75 GiB/rank; token embedding vocab-parallel (~1.18 GiB/rank
— the bf16 table is 2.43 GiB, sharding hands the other half to KV); lm_head
row-sharded; recurrent state 54 MiB/copy/card (2 copies with speculation);
KV from the `0.82`-side remainder of claimed VRAM at 96 MiB headroom.

## The engine contract (all verified in source, not assumed)

- **`/health` == `/ping`**: 200 JSON (`model_id, in_flight, queue_depth`)
  while serving, 503 only while stopping — **the listener binds AFTER the
  full load**, so a bare `curl -fsS http://127.0.0.1:7770/health` gate is
  honest (the deployer loops on it; the FreeToken-era `"status":"ok"` body
  grep is gone). Boot budget 1800 s (publisher `start_period` 15 m);
  measured 2026-10-06: health 200 ~2-3 min after start (~120 s warm) —
  the big terms are the 125.26 GiB page-in (38.1 s at 3.5 GB/s) and the
  host-pool pin (PLE 47.68 GiB in 43.9 s).
- **Sampling** (oai.cpp): `temperature, top_p, top_k, min_p, typical_p,
  presence_penalty, frequency_penalty, repetition_penalty, repeat_last_n,
  chat_template_kwargs, reasoning_effort, enable_thinking,
  preserve_thinking` accepted; **unknown params are refused (400)** —
  models.yml's extraBody set is fully inside it; nothing unverified rides
  the wire. `max_tokens` is clamped, not refused; `seed` absent = pick
  one; `response_format` supported; **`logprobs` is refused** (harness
  never sends it).
- **Reasoning**: `--reasoning-format` defaults to `auto` → thinking in
  `reasoning_content` (models.yml `reasoningContentField` matches). Tool
  calls: the qwen3.8 dialect → `message.tool_calls` +
  `finish_reason: tool_calls`. No parser flags anywhere — parsers are
  auto.
- **Vision**: the official checkpoint carries the 27-layer vision tower;
  the engine runs the Qwen-VL processor (patching, pad-token expansion,
  3-part rotary are core). `models.yml` keeps `input: [text, image]`;
  `--mm-max-patches` available.
- **`/metrics`**: vLLM-compatible names + `radiance:*` families — the
  Dankclaw Prometheus job re-scrapes 192.168.0.235:7770 (plain LAN routing
  reaches it; the netavark published-port quirk is same-host only).
  `/stats`, `/sessions`, `/dashboard` for live internals; the repo ships
  `deploy/grafana/radiance.json` if a dashboard is wanted.
- **`n` > 1 requests**: `n` defaults to `max(8, max-num-seqs)`; stop
  strings ≤ 64 × 4096 B. `model` field not enforced.

## Deploy + verify

```bash
# one-time (already done 2026-10-05): payload fetch + sha256 verify + convert
ssh dankserver 'bash /home/dank/frank-archon-build/build-frank-archon-rad.sh --plan-only'   # declare + plan, no bytes
ssh dankserver 'bash /home/dank/frank-archon-build/build-frank-archon-rad.sh'               # full convert + rad-info
./scripts/deploy.sh dankserver --service frank-archon
```

Post-cutover checklist (each is observable, not assumed):

1. Unit: `is-active` active, `is-enabled` enabled, container answers
   `/health` with 200 JSON.
2. Boot ledger (engine stdout → `/home/dank/logs/frank_archon.log`):
   P2P probe per rank pair, TP=2 shard placement, expert pool coverage
   line ("backs N % of the worst case … M full-length sessions"), KV pool
   bytes, PLE pinned-RAM line, drafter depth 3, prefix tiers.
3. MTP live: a completion's `timings` object shows draft/accept counts;
   `radiance:*spec*` metrics in `/metrics`.
4. Froggeric template: a probe prompt renders the v22.5 shape
   (tool-call + thinking turn both exercise it).
5. Vision: a ≥256 px solid-color PNG answers the exact color through an
   `image_url` content part.
6. Prometheus target `frank-archon` green (not never-green).

## Cutover measured (2026-10-06, all values observed live)

- Container: 1,857,127,997,440 B = 177,109 MiB = 173.0 GiB. Plan-only
  priced 172.76 GiB — the DATA planes; the written container adds a
  metadata tail. Floor gates must be set from the real file (the first
  deploy refused on 178000 > 177109; floor is 177000).
- Boot: 125.26 GiB read in 38.1 s (3.5 GB/s), PLE pinned
  "47.68 GiB in 43.9 s" (the 2 B scale plane with it), each rank's
  mover holds 25.46 GiB static+experts (19.15 GiB resident experts,
  79 %), 16,820 pinned pool slots, health 200 ~2-3 min after start
  (~120 s warm). No 7-minute vLLM-style boot.
- KV ledger: kv_attn 99,956 blocks = 2.48 GiB (399,824 tokens),
  kv_qsa_bkey 317.24 MiB, kv_gdn_state 4 slots × 54 MiB, PLE conv
  states < 1 MiB; linear checkpoints 56.37 MiB × 8 slots (3 of 8
  card-backed at boot, 5 withdrawn under the 208 MiB floor).
- MTP on real traffic (temp 0.7, 220-token ask): draft_n 225 /
  draft_n_accepted 119 = 52.9 % acceptance, decode 23.8 t/s. ONE
  sample — the shape's real number needs live-traffic measurement.
- Contracts: `reasoning_content` field (matches models.yml), usage
  metering separates reasoning_tokens; vision — a 512² solid-red PNG
  through `image_url` answers `Red` (279 prompt tokens; NOTE the
  32-token budget is eaten by thinking — give vision probes ≥256
  max_tokens); native `tool_calls` with finish_reason tool_calls.
- Boot defects fixed the same day: the SSD prefix tier opened only
  after the serve script mkdir -p'd the full path (the engine's
  create is NOT recursive: "cannot create /data/kvcache/..."); the
  converter's scale-name law, the PLE file-shadow and the
  symlink-through-raw-index bug are in the payload section above.
- Prometheus: `/metrics` answers 200 with vLLM-compatible families
  (verified from Dankclaw); the `frank-archon` job needs a
  prometheus-service deploy to go green (config pushed, reload
  deferred behind a live parallel writer's dirty tree).

## Tuning levers (in order of likely use)

- **`FRANK_ARCHON_MAX_SEQS`**: raise 2 → 3/4 only when the ledger's KV
  headroom line and real slot occupancy agree; each slot buys a
  recurrent-state copy (54 MiB/card) and shrinks the per-request KV share.
- **`FRANK_ARCHON_HOST_POOL_MIB`**: the ledger's coverage line is the
  oracle — it prints what the pool backs at the worst case and how many
  full-length sessions fit. RAM budget: pools + PLE + prefix ≤ ~140 GiB of
  the host's 246.
- **`FRANK_ARCHON_EXPERT_VS_CACHE`**: 0.82 is the measured 99 %-hit
  point; 0.87 zeroes it. Move only with a measured hit-rate reason.
- **`FRANK_ARCHON_TP_WIRE`**: `wht6` vs `exact` — `exact` trades the
  +5.6 % prefill for bit-exact reductions; the fused one-shot forms are
  declared over the seqs × (1+spec) row bound.
- **`FRANK_ARCHON_EXTRA_ARGS`**: the boot-ladder escape hatch, expanded
  unquoted.
- **`rad-tune -m <rad> --tp 2 --num-speculative-tokens 3`**: benchmarks
  the tunable space at this model's shapes on this machine, writes
  `$RADIANCE_HOME/tune/<machine>.tune` which the engine's selector reads at
  boot. Declare at the shapes you serve (`--tp 2
  --num-speculative-tokens 3`), or you measure a program the serve never
  runs. `$RADIANCE_HOME` is `/opt/radiance/share/radiance` — in the IMAGE — so a
  `--rm` scratch container's cache dies with it: the serve script
  bind-mounts `$FRANK_ARCHON_STATE_DIR/tune` (`/home/dank/radiance-state/tune`)
  at `/opt/radiance/share/radiance/tune`, so the cache (36 GEMM rows,
  `gfx1201-x3-AMD_Radeon_Graphics.tune`, generated 2026-10-06 in a
  stopped-service window) survives and is read at every production boot.
  The two attention requests have no shape recipe (`attn_paged`,
  `attn_paged_gate_quant` — "see tools/opshapes.h") and are not tuned.
  `RADIANCE_TUNE` pins a kernel for an A/B — an instrument, not a setting.
- **`FRANK_ARCHON_MAX_BATCHED_TOKENS` (MNBT)**: A/B'd 2026-10-06 in a
  stopped-service window (real-text probes: 20,417-token cold prefill,
  1,985-token warm prefill, 256-token decode). The prefill ladder is
  NON-MONOTONIC with an interior optimum at 2048: 1024 → 2048 → 4096 =
  231 → 460 → 448 t/s cold, 221 → 412 → 427 t/s warm. Decode is flat within
  noise (24.0 / 25.1 / 24.3 t/s); draft acceptance 60.1 / 67.1 / 63.3 %.
  **2048 wins** (peak prefill + peak acceptance) — it stays the production
  value. 1024 halves prefill (the batch too small to saturate the card);
  4096 is a hair off 2048 (the chunk past the kernel's sweet spot).
- **Diagnostics**: `rad-info` (container: encodings, recipe, profile),
  `--debug-graph` (what declared vs what issued), `rad-kbench` (kernel
  correctness/speed vs libref), `/stats` + `/sessions` (live), and the
  publisher's `scripts/` harnesses (`fnpf`, `fnconc`, `cstep2`, `ident`,
  `mctools`) — note `mcserve/fnstop`-family scripts `pkill` the engine
  binary by name; on this host the service is a systemd unit, so use
  `sudo systemctl stop frank-archon` instead.

## Rollback

| Layer | Path |
|---|---|
| FreeToken (one card, native FP8 safetensors) | `git checkout frank-archon-freetoken-pr587-20261005 -- scripts/frank-archon.env scripts/frank-archon.service scripts/serve-frank-archon.sh scripts/docker/ tests/frank_archon_unit.bats` + redeploy; the image in storage is `localhost/frank-primary-freetoken:pr587-77a7201`, and the payload `/home/dank/models/Qwen3.8-Flash-Next-Uncensored-FP8` must be re-fetched — it is gone from the host |
| tcclaviger vLLM fork (TP=2, shape G) | git tag `frank-archon-vllm-shapeG-20261003` (trio + env lore; image still in dank's rootless storage) |
| 4-bit StillDeadcode publisher shape | `qwen3.8-next-flash-fp8-iq4r-moe.rad` — **this became the live payload on 2026-10-15** ([[frank-archon-radiance-qwen38-iq4r]]), deployed with `--host-pool-mib 44928` (`scripts/frank-archon.env:184`), not the 12,288 MiB first sketched here |

The FreeToken-era orcarouter payload has since been deleted from the host
(`ls /home/dank/models/` on Dankserver, 2026-10-18) — there is nothing left to
trash, and the FreeToken rollback needs a re-fetch.

## Links

- [[LLM/index]] — fleet index
- [[frank-archon-freetoken-pr587]] — the retired FreeToken era
- [[dankserver-qwen38-fp8-expert-offload-tuning]] — the retired tcclaviger vLLM era
- [[Dual-R9700-Cooperation]] — the board swap that made TP=2 legal here
- [[RDNA4 Container Serving]] — rootless-podman GPU laws on these hosts
- `serverAppConfigs-docs/Architecture/Testing Policy.md` — the seam contract