package.restart resolved its container list via
ordered_containers_for_start, which injected every name from the
union startup_order list that wasn't already present — including
variant names not live on a given node (mysql-mempool,
archy-mempool-api, archy-mempool-web). The phantom mysql-mempool is
2nd in the mempool start order, so do_orchestrator_package_start hit
its unknown-app-id fallback, do_package_start failed the inspect
("no such object"), and the `?` aborted the whole start sequence —
leaving mempool-api + the frontend down until the health monitor
recovered them minutes later. That was the source of the 5× gate
flakes #73 (frontend not running in 180s) and #74 (api not queryable
in 300s); root-caused from the .228 journal
("Start failed: mysql-mempool").
Replace the inject-then-sort logic with a pure helper
order_present_containers that orders only the actually-present
containers and never adds phantom entries. startup_order remains a
union of name variants across install generations — it's now used
purely to order what's live, not to inject what isn't. +3 unit tests.
Also harden bitcoin-knots.bats "valid state" probe: poll ≤30s for a
settled state instead of a single-shot read, so a container caught
mid-reconcile (transient restarting/configured) can't flake a 20-min
iteration. A genuinely-stuck container never settles, so real
breakage is still caught.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
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