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Do a presentation at NTLUG.
What is the Linux Installation Project?
Real companies using Linux!
Not just for business anymore.
Providing ready to run platforms on Linux
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Show Descriptions... (Show All)
(Two Column)
- Kernel prepatch 6.19-rc3
Linus has released 6.19-rc3 for testing. "Another week, another -rc release.Except the past week has obviously been the holiday week, and this rcrelease is pretty small as a result. Very much as expected."
- [$] An early look at the Graphite 2D graphics editor
Graphite is an effort to unifyillustration, raster editing, desktop publishing, and animation in onebrowser-based application. The project has been in development since2020 and announced its first alpha release in 2022. According to creator Keavon Chambers, the project's mission is to become"the 2D counterpart to Blender", by bringing a node-based,non-destructive workflow to 2D graphics. The project, currently still inalpha, is a long way from complete; but it is worth testing for anyoneinvolved with open-source-graphics production. Currentbuilds, from September 2025, include vector-illustration tools, anode-based compositor, and early brush tooling, with broader pixel-based-and photo-editing work still in progress.
- Security updates for Friday
Security updates have been issued by Debian (gst-plugins-good1.0, postgresql-13, and python-urllib3), Fedora (chezmoi, docker-buildkit, ov, and subfinder), Oracle (httpd:2.4), Slackware (net), and SUSE (apache2, buildah, kernel, and mariadb).
- A partial ruling in the Vizio GPL suit
The judge in the Vizio GPL-compliance lawsuit has ruled, in asummary judgment, that the GNU General Public License, version 2,does not require the provision of signing keys needed to install modifiedsoftware on a device.
Read as a whole, the Agreements require Vizio to make the source code available in such a manner that the source code can be readily obtained and modified by Plaintiff or other third parties. While source code is defined to include "the scripts used to control compilation and installation," this does not mean that Vizio must allow users to reinstall the software, modified or otherwise, back onto its smart TVs in a manner that preserves all features of the original program and/or ensures the smart TVs continue to function properly. Rather, in the context of the Agreements, the disputed language means that Vizio must provide the source code in a manner that allows the source code to be obtained and revised by Plaintiff or others for use in other applications.
As the Software Freedom Conservancy, the plaintiff in the case, has pointedout, the judge has ruled against a claim that was never actually made.
SFC has never held the position, nor do we today hold the position, that any version of the GPL (even including GPLv3!) require "that the device continues to function properly" after a user installs their modified version of the copyleft components.
Linus Torvalds, meanwhile, has posted his own takeon the ruling that has, as one might imagine, sparked an extendeddiscussion as well.
- Ruby 4.0 released
Once again there is a brand-new release under the tree from theRuby programming-language project: Ruby 4.0has been released with many new features and improvements. Notablechanges include the experimental Ruby Boxfeature for in-process isolation of classes and modules, a newjust-in-time compiler called ZJIT, and improvements to Ruby'sparallel-execution mechanism (Ractor). There are a number of languagechanges as well. See the documentationfor Ruby 4.0 for more.
- Security updates for Thursday
Security updates have been issued by Fedora (httpd, retroarch, and roundcubemail), Oracle (container-tools:rhel8, grafana, httpd, kernel, python3.12, python39:3.9, thunderbird, and uek-kernel), and SUSE (cheat, go-sendxmpp, and kernel).
- [$] LWN.net Weekly Edition for December 25, 2025
Inside this week's LWN.net Weekly Edition:
Front: 2025 retrospective; Dirk and Linus talk; successful open-source documentation projects; verifier-state pruning in BPF; Linux 32-bit timeline; BPF state visualizer; systemd v259. Briefs: linux-next maintainer; 2025 TAB; Git in Debian; Elementary OS 8.1; Qubes OS 4.3.0; GDB 17.1; Incus 6.20; systemd v259; Quotes; ... Announcements: Newsletters, conferences, security updates, patches, and more.
- [$] A 2025 retrospective
Another year has reached its conclusion. That can only mean one thing: thetime has come to take a look back at thepredictions we made in January and evaluate just how badly they turnedout. Much to our surprise, not all of our predictions were entirelyaccurate. It has been a wild year in the Linux community and beyond, tosay the least.
- [$] What's new in systemd v259
The systemd v259release was announced on December 17, just three months afterv258. It is a more modest release but still includes a number ofimportant changes such as a new option for the run0 command(an alternative to sudo), ability to mount user home directories from the host in virtualmachines, as well as under-the-hood changes with dlopen()for library linking, the ability to compile systemd with musl libc,and more.
- Security updates for Wednesday
Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (container-tools:rhel8, grafana, opentelemetry-collector, and thunderbird), Red Hat (kernel), and SUSE (cheat, libsoup, mariadb, mozjs52, python310, python315, qemu, rsync, and zk).
- 44% Of GNOME Core Apps Are Written In C, 13% In JavaScript & 10% In Rust
GNOME developer Sophie Herold has shared some interesting end-of-year code stats for the GNOME project. The "GNOME" codebase is up to 6,692,516 lines of code at the end of 2025 with 1,611,526 lines of that being from GNOME apps. Where the data gets interesting is on the programming language breakdown in different areas...
- Blender 5.0 Benchmarks Since Blender 3.0 For CPU Rendering Performance
As part of the many different year-end benchmarks on Phoronix, over the holidays I was curious about how far the Blender 3D modeling software's performance has evolved over the past few years. So in looking at the CPU rendering performance I ran benchmarks of the major releases since Blender 3.0 through the recently released Blender 5.0...
- 'No Happy Ending for Movie Theatres', Argues WSJ - No Matter Who Wins Warner Bros.
Regardless of who ends up owning Warners Bros., "the outlook for theatrical movies is dimming," writes a Wall Street Journal tech columnist, noting that this year's U.S. box office of $8.3 billion (as of December 25) "is a bit below last year's and well below prepandemic levels of around $11 billion."Warner has historically been one of Hollywood's largest producers of theatrical films, averaging about 22 releases annually in the pre-Covid years of 2015 to 2019, according to data from Comscore. Its franchises include "Harry Potter," the DC Comics characters and "Lord of the Rings." But the current bidding war between Netflix and Paramount Skydance means Warner's future will ultimately be in the hands of either a streaming giant with a longstanding distaste for movie theaters, or a rival studio that will carry a sky-high debt load and therefore a need to sharply cut costs... [Though later the article cites a Wedbush analyst's observation that the current theatrical slate has already been negotiated through 2029, "so any buyer would have to honor those contracts" with theatrical releases for Warner films "for at least the next four years."] Investors seem deeply skeptical. Cinemark shares have shed about 18% of their value over the past month, while rival exhibitor AMC Entertainment is down more than 30%. Morgan Stanley recently downgraded Cinemark to a neutral rating, with analyst Ben Swinburne noting that concern over Netflix's commitment to theatrical distribution and release windows "is likely to cap the multiple" on Cinemark's stock.... [T]ime hasn't been on the side of movie theaters for a while now, and a takeover of Warner Bros. won't turn back that clock.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Did Tim Cook Post AI Slop in His Christmas Message Promoting 'Pluribus'?
Artist Keith Thomson is a modern (and whimsical) Edward Hopper. And Apple TV says he created the "festive artwork" shared on X by Apple CEO Tim Cook on Christmas Eve, "made on MacBook Pro." Its intentionally-off picture of milk and cookies was meant to tease the season finale of Pluribus. ("Merry Christmas Eve, Carol..." Cook had posted.) But others were convinced that the weird image was AI-generated. Tech blogger John Gruber was blunt. "Tim Cook posts AI Slop in Christmas message on Twitter/X, ostensibly to promote 'Pluribus'."As for sloppy details, the carton is labeled both "Whole Milk" and "Lowfat Milk", and the "Cow Fun Puzzle" maze is just goofily wrong. (I can't recall ever seeing a puzzle of any kind on a milk carton, because they're waxy and hard to write on. It's like a conflation of milk cartons and cereal boxes.) Tech author Ben Kamens — who just days earlier had blogged about generating mazes with AI — said the image showed the "specific quirks" of generative AI mazes (including the way the maze couldn't be solved, expect by going around the maze altogether). Former Google Ventures partner M.G. Siegler even wondered if AI use intentionally echoed the themes of Pluribus — e.g., the creepiness of a collective intelligence — since otherwise "this seems far too obvious to be a mistake/blunder on Apple's part." (Someone on Reddit pointed out that in Pluribus's dystopian world, milk plays a key role — and the open spout of the "natural" milk's carton does touch a suspiciously-shining light on the Christmas tree...) Slashdot contacted artist Keith Thomson to try to ascertain what happened...
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Texas Father Rescues Kidnapped 15-Year-Old Daughter After Tracking Her Phone's Location
An anonymous reader shared this report from The Guardian:A Texas father used the parental controls on his teenage daughter's cell phone to find and help rescue her after she was kidnapped at knifepoint while walking her dog on Christmas, authorities allege... Her father subsequently located her phone through the device's parental controls, the agency's statement said. The phone was about 2 miles (3.2km) away from him in a secluded, partly wooded area in neighboring Harris county... She then managed to escape with a hand from her father, who called law enforcement officials, said the statement from the Montgomery sheriff's office. The suspect has since been arrested and charged.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Up Next for Arduino After Qualcomm Acquisition: High-Performance Computing
Even after its acquisition by Qualcomm, the EFF believes Arduino "isn't imposing any new bans on tinkering with or reverse engineering Arduino boards," (according to Mitch Stoltz, EFF director for competition and IP litigation). While Adafruit's managing editor Phillip Torrone had claimed to 36,000+ followers on LinkedIn that Arduino users were now "explicitly forbidden from reverse engineering," Arduino corrected him in a blog post, noting that clause in their Terms & Conditions was only for Arduino's Software-as-a-Service cloud applications. "Anything that was open, stays open." And this week EE Times spoke to Guneet Bedi, SVP of Arduino, "who was unequivocal in saying that Arduino's governance structure had remained intact even after the acquisition.""As a business unit within Qualcomm, Arduino continues to make independent decisions on its product portfolio, with no direction imposed on where it should or should not go," Bedi said. "Everything that Arduino builds will remain open and openly available to developers, with design engineers, students and makers continuing to be the primary focus.... Developers who had mastered basic embedded workflows were now asking how to run large language models at the edge and work with artificial intelligence for vision and voice, with an open source mindset," he said. According to Bedi, this was where Qualcomm's technology became relevant. "Qualcomm's chipsets are high performance while also being very low power, which comes from their mobile and Android phone heritage. Despite being great technology, it is not easily accessible to design engineers because of cost and complexity. That made this a strong fit," he said. The most visible outcome of this acquisition is Uno Q, which Bedi described as being comparable to a mid-tier Android phone in capability, starting at a price of $44. For Arduino, this marked a shift beyond microcontrollers without abandoning them. "At the end of the day, we have not gone away from our legacy," Bedi said. "You still have a real-time microcontroller, and you still write code the way Arduino developers are used to. What we added is compute, without forcing people to change how they work." Uno Q combines a Linux-based compute system with a real-time microcontroller from the STM32 family. "You do not need two different development environments or two different hardware platforms," Bedi added... Rather than introducing a customized operating system, Arduino chose standard Debian upstream. "We are not locking developers into anything," Bedi said. "It is standard Debian, completely open...." Pre-built models covering tasks like object detection and voice recognition run locally on the board.... While the first reference design uses Qualcomm silicon, Bedi was careful to stress that this does not define the roadmap. "There is zero dependency on Qualcomm silicon," he said. "The architecture is portable. Tomorrow, we can run this on something else." That distinction matters, particularly for developers wary of vendor lock-in following the acquisition. Uno Q does compete directly with platforms like Raspberry Pi and Nvidia Jetson, but Bedi framed the difference less in terms of raw performance and more in flexibility. "When you build on those platforms, you are locked to the board," he said. "Here, you can build a prototype, and if you like it, you can also get access to the chip and design your own hardware." With built-in storage removing the need for external components, Uno Q positions itself less as a faster board and more as a way to simplify what had become an increasingly messy development stack... Looking a year ahead, Bedi believes developers should experience continuity rather than disruption. The familiar Arduino approach to embedded and real-time systems remains unchanged, while extending naturally into more compute-intensive applications... Taken together, Bedi's comments suggest that Arduino's post-acquisition direction is less about changing what Arduino is, and more about expanding what it can realistically be used for, without abandoning the simplicity that made it relevant in the first place. "We want to redefine prototyping in the age of physical artificial intelligence," Bedi said...
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Google's 'AI Overview' Wrongly Accused a Musician of Being a Sex Offender
An anonymous reader shared this report from the CBC:Cape Breton fiddler Ashley MacIsaac says he may have been defamed by Google after it recently produced an AI-generated summary falsely identifying him as a sex offender. The Juno Award-winning musician said he learned of the online misinformation last week after a First Nation north of Halifax confronted him with the summary and cancelled a concert planned for Dec. 19. "You are being put into a less secure situation because of a media company — that's what defamation is," MacIsaac said in a telephone interview with The Canadian Press, adding he was worried about what might have happened had the erroneous content surfaced while he was trying to cross an international border... The 50-year-old virtuoso fiddler said he later learned the inaccurate claims were taken from online articles regarding a man in Atlantic Canada with the same last name... [W]hen CBC News reached him by phone on Christmas Eve, he said he'd already received queries from law firms across the country interested in taking it on pro bono.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- How Will Rising RAM Prices Affect Laptop Companies?
Laptop makers are facing record-setting memory prices next year. The site Notebookcheck catalogs how different companies are responding: Sources told [Korean business newspaper] Chosun Biz that some manufacturers have signed preliminary contracts with Samsung, Micron, and SK Hynix. Even so, it won't prevent DDR5 RAM prices from soaring 45% higher by the end of 2026.... Before the memory shortage, PC sales had been on the upswing in part because of forced Windows 11 upgrades. That trend will likely reverse in 2026, as buyers avoid Lenovo laptops and alternatives from its rivals. Realizing a slowdown in purchases is inevitable, postponed launches are one potential outcome. Other manufacturers, including Dell and Framework have already announced impending price hikes... [The article also cites reports that one laptop manufacturer "plans to raise the prices of high-end models by as much as 30%."] U.S.-based Maingear now encourages customers to mail in their own modules to complete custom builds. Yet, without recycling parts from older systems, that won't result in significant savings for consumers.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Challenges Face European Governments Pursuing 'Digital Sovereignty'
The Register reports on challenges facing Europe's pursuit of "digital sovereignty":The US CLOUD Act of 2018 allows American authorities to compel US-based technology companies to provide requested data, regardless of where that data is stored globally. This places European organizations in a precarious position, as it directly clashes with Europe's own stringent privacy regulation, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)... Furthermore, these warrants often come with a gag order, legally prohibiting the provider from informing their customer that their data has been accessed. This renders any contractual clauses requiring transparency or notification effectively meaningless. While technical measures like encryption are often proposed as a solution, their effectiveness depends entirely on who controls the encryption keys. If the US provider manages the keys, as is common in many standard cloud services, they can be forced to decrypt the data for authorities, making such safeguards moot.... American hyperscalers have recognized the market demand for sovereignty and now aggressively market 'sovereign cloud' solutions, typically by placing datacenters on European soil or partnering with local operators. Critics call this 'sovereignty washing'... [Cristina Caffarra, a competition economistand driving force behind the Eurostack initiative] warns that this does not resolve the fundamental problem. "A company subject to the extraterritorial laws of the United States cannot be considered sovereign for Europe," she says. "That simply doesn't work." Because, as long as the parent company is American, it remains subject to the CLOUD Act... Even when organizations make deliberate choices in favour of European providers, those decisions can be undone by market forces. A recent acquisition in the Netherlands illustrates this risk. In November 2025, the American IT services giant Kyndryl announced its intention to acquire Solvinity, a Dutch managed cloud provider. This came as an "unpleasant surprise" to several of its government clients, including the municipality of Amsterdam and the Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security. These bodies had specifically chosen Solvinity to reduce their dependence on American firms and mitigate CLOUD Act risks. Still, The Register provides several examples of government systems that are "taking concrete steps to regain control over their IT."Austria's Federal Ministry for Economy, Energy and Tourism now has 1,200 employees on the European open-source collaboration platform Nextcloud, leading several other Austrian ministries to also implement Nextcloud. (The Ministry's CISO tells the Register "We can see our input in Nextcloud releases. That is a feeling we never had with Microsoft.")France's Ministry of Economics and Finance recently completed NUBO (which the Register describes as "an OpenStack-based private cloud initiative designed to handle sensitive data and services.")In November the International Criminal Court in The Hague announced it was replacing its Microsoft office software with a European alternative. The German state of Schleswig-Holstein is replacing Microsoft products with open-source alternatives for 30,000 civil servantsThanks to long-time Slashdot reader mspohr for sharing the article.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Is Dark Energy Weakening?
An anonymous reader shared this report from the BBC:There is growing controversy over recent evidence suggesting that a mysterious force known as dark energy might be changing in a way that challenges our current understanding of time and space. An analysis by a South Korean team has hinted that, rather than the Universe continuing to expand, galaxies could be pulled back together by gravity, ending in what astronomers call a "Big Crunch". The scientists involved believe that they may be on the verge of one of the biggest discoveries in astronomy for a generation. Other astronomers have questioned these findings, but these critics have not been able to completely dismiss the South Korean team's assertions... The controversy began in March with unexpected results from an instrument on a telescope in the Arizona desert called the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (Desi)... The data hinted that acceleration of the galaxies had changed over time, something not in line with the standard picture, according to Prof Ofer Lehav of University College London, who is involved with the Desi project. "Now with this changing dark energy going up and then down, again, we need a new mechanism. And this could be a shake up for the whole of physics," he says. Then in November the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS) published research from a South Korean team that seems to back the view that the weirdness of dark energy is weirder still. Prof Young Wook Lee of Yonsei University in Seoul and his team went back to the kind of supernova data that first revealed dark energy 27 years ago. Instead of treating these stellar explosions as having one standard brightness, they adjusted for the ages of the galaxies they came from and worked out how bright the supernovas really were. This adjustment showed that not only had dark energy changed over time, but, shockingly, that the acceleration was slowing down... If, as Prof Lee's results suggest, the force that is pushing galaxies away from each other — dark energy — is weakening, then one possibility is that it becomes so weak that gravity begins to pull the galaxies back together.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Sal Khan: Companies Should Give 1% of Profits To Retrain Workers Displaced By AI
"I believe artificial intelligence will displace workers at a scale many people don't yet realize," says Sal Kahn (founder/CEO of the nonprofit Khan Academy). But in an op-ed in the New York Times he also proposes a solution that "could change the trajectory of the lives of millions who will be displaced..." "I believe that every company benefiting from automation — which is most American companies — should... dedicate 1 percent of its profits to help retrain the people who are being displaced."This isn't charity. It is in the best interest of these companies. If the public sees corporate profits skyrocketing while livelihoods evaporate, backlash will follow — through regulation, taxes or outright bans on automation. Helping retrain workers is common sense, and such a small ask that these companies would barely feel it, while the public benefits could be enormous... Roughly a dozen of the world's largest corporations now have a combined profit of over a trillion dollars each year. One percent of that would create a $10 billion annual fund that, in part, could create a centralized skill training platform on steroids: online learning, ways to verify skills gained and apprenticeships, coaching and mentorship for tens of millions of people. The fund could be run by an independent nonprofit that would coordinate with corporations to ensure that the skills being developed are exactly what are needed. This is a big task, but it is doable; over the past 15 years, online learning platforms have shown that it can be done for academic learning, and many of the same principles apply for skill training. "The problem isn't that people can't work," Khan writes in the essay. "It's that we haven't built systems to help them continue learning and connect them to new opportunities as the world changes rapidly."To meet the challenges, we don't need to send millions back to college. We need to create flexible, free paths to hiring, many of which would start in high school and extend through life. Our economy needs low-cost online mechanisms for letting people demonstrate what they know. Imagine a model where capability, not how many hours students sit in class, is what matters; where demonstrated skills earn them credit and where employers recognize those credits as evidence of readiness to enter an apprenticeship program in the trades, health care, hospitality or new categories of white-collar jobs that might emerge... There is no shortage of meaningful work — only a shortage of pathways into it. Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader destinyland for sharing the article.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Military Planners Dread the Arctic, 'Where Drones Drop Dead and GPS Goes Haywire'
An anonymous reader shared this report from the Wall Street Journal:Sending drones and robots into battle, rather than humans, has become a tenet of modern warfare. Nowhere does that make more sense than in the frozen expanses of the Arctic. But the closer you get to the North Pole, the less useful cutting-edge technology becomes. Magnetic storms distort satellite signals; frigid temperatures drain batteries or freeze equipment in minutes; navigation systems lack reference points on snowfields. During a seven-nation polar exercise in Canada earlier this year to test equipment worth millions of dollars, the U.S. military's all-terrain arctic vehicles broke down after 30 minutes because hydraulic fluids congealed in the cold. Swedish soldiers participating in the exercise were handed $20,000 night-vision optics that broke because the aluminum in the goggles couldn't handle the minus 40 degree Fahrenheit conditions.... An arctic conflict would force war planners back to basics. Extreme cold makes the most common components brittle. Low temperatures alter the physical properties of rubber, causing seals to lose their elasticity and leak. Traces of water or humidity freeze into ice crystals that can scratch pumps and create blockages. Wires should be insulated with silicone rather than PVC, which can crack. Oil and other lubricants thicken and congeal. In most standard hydraulic systems, fluid becomes syrupy and can affect everything from aircraft controls to missile launchers and radar masts. A single freeze-up can knock out an entire weapons platform or immobilize a convoy. Even the Aurora Borealis interferes with radio communications and satellite-navigation systems, according to the article.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Death, torture, and amputation: How cybercrime shook the world in 2025
The human harms of cyberattacks piled up this year, and violence expected to increase
The knock-on, and often unintentional, impacts of a cyberattack are so rarely discussed. As an industry, the focus is almost always placed on the economic damage: the ransom payment; the cost of business downtime; and goodness, don't forget those poor shareholders.…
- Stop the slop by disabling AI features in Chrome
The most popular desktop browser is festooned with Google AI, but you can make at least some of it go away
Most of today’s desktop web browsers come with a ton of built-in AI features, but the good news is that, in most cases, no one is forcing you to use them, and you can at least hide them from view. Removing the most egregious AI tools from Chrome is pretty simple, but it requires a few steps.…
- Coming Wi-Fi 8 will bring reliability rather than greater speed
Smarter access-point handoffs, better scheduling, fewer stalls
Wi-Fi 8 will be a step change in connectivity, if Intel can be believed, and will be able to adapt intelligently to local conditions to deliver a reliable service without the slowdowns users often experience when the network is congested.…
- Security: Why Linux Is Better Than Windows Or Mac OS
Linux is a free and open source operating system that was released in 1991 developed and released by Linus Torvalds. Since its release it has reached a user base that is greatly widespread worldwide. Linux users swear by the reliability and freedom that this operating system offers, especially when compared to its counterparts, windows and [0]
- Essential Software That Are Not Available On Linux OS
An operating system is essentially the most important component in a computer. It manages the different hardware and software components of a computer in the most effective way. There are different types of operating system and everything comes with their own set of programs and software. You cannot expect a Linux program to have all [0]
- Things You Never Knew About Your Operating System
The advent of computers has brought about a revolution in our daily life. From computers that were so huge to fit in a room, we have come a very long way to desktops and even palmtops. These machines have become our virtual lockers, and a life without these network machines have become unimaginable. Sending mails, [0]
- How To Fully Optimize Your Operating System
Computers and systems are tricky and complicated. If you lack a thorough knowledge or even basic knowledge of computers, you will often find yourself in a bind. You must understand that something as complicated as a computer requires constant care and constant cleaning up of junk files. Unless you put in the time to configure [0]
- The Top Problems With Major Operating Systems
There is no such system which does not give you any problems. Even if the system and the operating system of your system is easy to understand, there will be some times when certain problems will arise. Most of these problems are easy to handle and easy to get rid of. But you must be [0]
- 8 Benefits Of Linux OS
Linux is a small and a fast-growing operating system. However, we can’t term it as software yet. As discussed in the article about what can a Linux OS do Linux is a kernel. Now, kernels are used for software and programs. These kernels are used by the computer and can be used with various third-party software [0]
- Things Linux OS Can Do That Other OS Cant
What Is Linux OS? Linux, similar to U-bix is an operating system which can be used for various computers, hand held devices, embedded devices, etc. The reason why Linux operated system is preferred by many, is because it is easy to use and re-use. Linux based operating system is technically not an Operating System. Operating [0]
- Packagekit Interview
Packagekit aims to make the management of applications in the Linux and GNU systems. The main objective to remove the pains it takes to create a system. Along with this in an interview, Richard Hughes, the developer of Packagekit said that he aims to make the Linux systems just as powerful as the Windows or [0]
- What’s New in Ubuntu?
What Is Ubuntu? Ubuntu is open source software. It is useful for Linux based computers. The software is marketed by the Canonical Ltd., Ubuntu community. Ubuntu was first released in late October in 2004. The Ubuntu program uses Java, Python, C, C++ and C# programming languages. What Is New? The version 17.04 is now available here [0]
- Ext3 Reiserfs Xfs In Windows With Regards To Colinux
The problem with Windows is that there are various limitations to the computer and there is only so much you can do with it. You can access the Ext3 Reiserfs Xfs by using the coLinux tool. Download the tool from the official site or from the sourceforge site. Edit the connection to “TAP Win32 Adapter [0]
- Apples terrible UI design is not the fault of just one fall guy
Theres been endless talk online about just how bad Apples graphical user interface design has become over the years, culminating in the introduction of Liquid Glass across all of the companys operating systems this year. Despite all the gnawing of teeth and scathing think pieces before the final rollout, it seems the average Apple user simply doesnt care as much about GUI design as Apple bloggers thought they did, as there hasnt been any uproar or stories in local media about how you should hold off on updating your iPhone. The examples of just how bad Apples GUI design has become keep on coming, though. This time its Howard Oakley showing once again how baffling the macOS UI is these days. If someone had told me 12 months ago what was going to happen this past year, I wouldn’t have believed them. Skipping swiftly past all the political, economic and social turmoil, I come to the interface changes brought in macOS Tahoe with Liquid Glass. After three months of strong feedback during beta-testing, I was disappointed when Tahoe was released on 15 September to see how little had been addressed. When 26.1 followed on 3 November it had only regressed, and 26.2 has done nothing. Here I summarise my opinions on where Tahoe’s overhaul has gone wrong. ↫ Howard Oakley at The Eclectic Light Company Apple bloggers and podcasters are hell-bent on blaming Apples terrible GUI design over the past 10 years on one man. Their first target was Jony Ive, who was handed control over not just hardware design, but also software design in 2012. When he left Apple, GUI design at Apple would finally surely improve again, and the Apple bloggers and podcasters let out a sigh of relief. History would turn out different, though under Ives successor, Alan Dye, Apples downward trajectory in this area would continue unabated, culminating in the Liquid Glass abomination. Now that Alan Dye has left Apple, history is repeating itself: the very same Apple bloggers and podcasters are repeating themselves surely now that Alan Dye is gone, GUI design at Apple will finally surely improve again. The possibility that GUI design at Apple does not hinge on the whims of just one person, but that instead the entire company has lost all sense of taste and craftmanship in this area does not cross their minds. Everyone around Jony Ive and Alan Dye, both below, alongside, and above them, had to sign off on Apples recent direction in GUI design, and the idea that the entire company would blindly follow whatever one person says, quality be damned, would have me far more worried as an Apple fan. At this point, its clear that Apples inability to design and build quality user interfaces is not the fault of just one fall guy, but an institutional problem. Anyone expecting a turnaround just because Ive Dye is gone isnt seeing the burning forest through the trees.
- The HTML elements time forgot
Were all familiar with things like marquee and blink, relics of HTML of the past, but there are far more weird and obscure HTML tags you may not be aware of. Luckily, Declan Chidlow at HTMLHell details a few of them so we can all scratch shake our heads in disbelief. But there are far more obscure tags which are perhaps less visually dazzling but equally or even more interesting. If youre younger, this might very well be your introduction to them. If youre older, this still might be an introduction, but also possibly a trip down memory lane or a flashback to the horrors of the first browser war. It depends. ↫ Declan Chidlow at HTMLHell I think my favourite is the dir tag, intended to be used to display lists of files and directories. Were supposed to use list tags now to achieve the same result, but I do kind of like the idea of having a dedicated tag to indicate files, and perhaps have browsers render these lists in the same way the file manager of the platform its running on does. I dont know if that was possible, but it seems like the logical continuation of a hypothetical dir tag. Anyway, should we implement bgsound on OSNews?
- Package managers keep using git as a database, it never works out
If you’re building a package manager and git-as-index seems appealing, look at Cargo, Homebrew, CocoaPods, vcpkg, Go. They all had to build workarounds as they grew, causing pain for users and maintainers. The pull request workflow is nice. The version history is nice. You will hit the same walls they did. ↫ Andrew Nesbitt Its wild to read some of these stories. I cant believe CocoaPods had 16000 directories contained in a single directory, which is absolutely bananas when you know how git actually works. Then theres the issue that git is case-sensitive, as any proper file system should be, which causes major headaches on Windows and macOS, which are dumb and are case-insensitive. Even Windows path length limits, inherited from DOS, cause problems with git. There just so many problems with using git for a package managers database. The basic gist is that git is not a database, and shouldnt be used as such. Its incredulous to me that seasoned developers would opt for solutions! like this.
- QNX releases new desktop-focused image: QNX 8.0 with Xfce on Wayland
Christmas is already behind us, but since this is an announcement from 11 December that I missed Im calling this a very interesting and surprising Christmas present. The team and I are beyond excited to share what weve been cooking up over the last little while: a full desktop environment running on QNX 8.0, with support for self-hosted compilation! This environment both makes it easier for newly-minted QNX developers to get started with building for QNX, but it also vastly simplifies the process of porting Linux applications and libraries to QNX 8.0. ↫ John Hanam at the QNX Developer Blog What we have here is QNX 8.0 running the Xfce desktop environment on Wayland, a whole slew of build and development tools like clang, gcc, git, etc.), a ton of popular code editors and IDEs, a web browser (looks like GNOME Web?), access to all the ports on the QNX Open-Source Dashboard, and more. For now, its only available as a Qemu image to run on top of Ubuntu, but the plan is to also release an x86 image in the coming months so you can run this directly on real hardware. This isnt quite the same as the QNX of old with its unique Photon microGUI, but its been known for a while now that Photon hasnt been actively developed in a long time and is basically abandoned. Running Xfce on Wayland is obviously a much more sensible solution, and one thats quite future-proof, too. As a certified QNX desktop enthusiast of yore, I cant wait for the x86 image to arrive so I can try this out properly. There are downsides. This image, too, is encumbered by annoying non-commercial license requirements and sign-ups, and this also wouldnt be the first time QNX starts an enthusiast effort, only to abandon it shortly after. Buyer beware, then, but Im cautiously optimistic.
- Phoenix: a modern X server written in Zig
Weve got more X11-related news this day, the day of Xmas. Phoenix is a new X server, written from scratch in Zig (not a fork of Xorg server). This X server is designed to be a modern alternative to the Xorg server. ↫ Phoenix readme page Phoenix will only support a modern subset of the X11 protocol, focusing on making sure modern applications from roughly the last 20 years or so work. It also takes quite a few pages out of the Wayland playbook by not having a server driver interface and by having a compositor included. On top of that, it will isolate applications from each other, and wont have a single framebuffer for all displays, instead allowing different refresh rates for individual displays. The project also intends to develop new standards to support things like per-monitor DPI, among many other features. Thats a lot of features and capabilities to promise for an X server, and much like Wayland, the way they aim to get there is by effectively gutting traditional X and leaving a ton of cruft behind. The use of Zig is also interesting, as it can catch some issues before they affect any users thanks to Zigs runtime safety option. At least its not yet another thing written in Rust like every other project competing with an established project. I think this look like an incredibly interesting project to keep an eye on, and I hope more people join the effort. Competition and fresh, new ideas are good, especially now that everything is gravitating towards Wayland we need alternatives to promote the sharing of ideas.
- Wayback 0.3 released
Wayback, the tool that will allow you to run a legacy X11 desktop environment on top of Wayland, released a new version just before the Christmas. Wayback 0.3 overhauls its custom command line option parser to allow for more X.org options to be supported, and its manual pages have been cleaned up. Other fixes merely include fixing some small typos and similar small changes. Wayback is now also part of Alpine Linux stable releases, and has been made available in Fedora 42 and 43. Wayback remains alpha software and is still under major development its not yet ready for primetime.
- GateMate Personal Computer, inspired by IBM PC
Can you use a cheap FPGA board as a base for a new computer inspired by the original IBM PC? Well, yes, of course, so thats what Yuri Zaporozhets has set out to do just that. Based on the GateMateA1-EVB, the projects got some of the basics worked out already video output, keyboard support, etc. and work is underway on a DOS-like operating system. A ton of work is still ahead, of course, but its definitely an interesting project.
- Elementary OS 8.1 released
Elementary OS, the user-friendly Linux distribution with its own unique desktop environment and applications, just released elementary OS 8.1. Its minor version number belies just how big of a punch this update packs, so dont be fooled here. We released elementary OS 8 last November with a new Secure Session—powered by Wayland—that ensures applications respect your privacy and consent, a brand new Dock with productive multitasking and window management features, expanded access to cross-platform apps, a revamped updates experience, and new features and settings that empower our diverse community through Inclusive Design. Over the last year we’ve continued to build upon that work to deliver new features and fix issues based on your feedback, plus we’ve improved support for a range of devices including HiDPI and Multi-touch devices. ↫ Danielle Foré at the elementary OS blog The biggest change from a lower-level perspective is that elementary OS 8.1 changes the default session to Wayland, leaving the X11 session as a fallback in case of issues. Since the release of elementary OS 8, a ton of progress has been made in improving the Wayland session, fixing remaining issues, and so on, and the team now feels its ready to serve as the default session. Related to this is a new security feature in the Wayland session where the rest of the screen gets dimmed when a password dialog pops up, and other windows cant steal focus. The switch to Wayland also allowed the team to bring fractional scaling to elementary OS with 8.1. Elementary OS is based on Ubuntu, and this new release brings an updated Hardware Enablement stack, which brings things like Linux 6.14 and Mesa 25. This is also the first release with support for ARM64 devices that can use UEFI, which includes quite a few popular ARM devices. Of course, the ARM64 version comes as a separate ISO. Furthermore, theres a ton of improvements to the dock which was released with 8 as a brand-new replacement for the venerable Plank including bringing back some features that were lost in the transition from Plank to the new dock. Animations are smoother, elementary OS application store has seen a slew of improvements from clearer licensing information, to a controller icon for games that support them, to a label identifying applications that offer in-app purchases, and more. Theres a lot more here, like the accessibility improvements we talked about a few months ago, and tons more.
- Amifuse: native Amiga filesystems on macOS and Linux with FUSE
Mount Amiga filesystem images on macOS/Linux using native AmigaOS filesystem handlers via FUSE. amifuse runs actual Amiga filesystem drivers (like PFS3) through m68k CPU emulation, allowing you to read Amiga hard disk images without relying on reverse-engineered implementations. ↫ Amifuse GitHub page Absolutely wild.
- UNIX v4 tape successfully recovered
Almost two months ago, a tape containing UNIX v4 was found. It was sent off to the Computer History Museum where bitsavers.org would handle the further handling of the tape, and this process has now completed. You can download the contents of the tape from Archive.org which is sadly down at the moment while squoze.net has a readme with instructions on how to actually run the copy of UNIX v4 recovered from the tape.
- Looking Ahead: What 2026 Holds for the Linux Ecosystem
by George Whittaker
Linux has always been more than just a kernel, it’s a living, breathing world of innovation, community collaboration, and divergent use cases. As we roll into 2026, the landscape is poised for exciting growth. From continuing evolution of core kernel infrastructure to newfound momentum in areas like gaming, AI-augmented tooling, hardware support and security, the coming year promises both refinement and transformation. Whether you’re a developer, system administrator, gamer, or casual user, here’s what you can expect from the Linux world in 2026.
1. Kernel Evolution: Performance, Security, and AI-Driven Behavior
The Linux kernel remains the beating heart of the OS. In 2026, we’ll likely see:
New Long-Term Support (LTS) Baselines: With releases like 6.18 already declared LTS and successor branches maturing, distributions will rally around kernels that offer both performance gains and security longevity.
AI-Driven Infrastructure: Kernel subsystems may start experimenting with machine-learning-informed scheduling, resource management, or dynamic power/performance tuning, not via heavy inference at runtime, but via control-plane advice integrated at build or boot time.
Security Innovation: Hardware vulnerabilities like VMScape and speculative execution side channels have taught us that kernel mitigations remain crucial. Expect continued work on microarchitecture hardening, pointer tagging, and improved isolation.
The overall trend points to a kernel that is both more performant and more robust, without compromising the modularity that makes Linux adaptable across systems from supercomputers to handhelds.
2. The Desktop Experience: Polished, Consistent, and Accessible
For desktop users, 2026 should bring visible improvements to everyday workflows:
Wayland Maturity: Wayland adoption continues to solidify across distributions, with fewer fallbacks to legacy X11 backends. Compositors and toolkits will refine scaling, multi-monitor behavior, and screen capture APIs.
Accessibility Gains: Distros will invest more in accessibility, bringing improved screen reader support, better keyboard navigation, and wide internationalization.
Distribution Diversity: More polished newcomers and revitalizations of existing distros will continue, especially projects aimed at lowering the barrier to entry for users migrating from Windows or macOS.
The promise here is a Linux desktop that feels friendly without diluting depth for advanced customization.
3. Cloud, Edge, and Server Infrastructure: Linux Everywhere
Linux powers the backbone of the modern server and cloud world. In 2026:
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- Top Linux Distributions for Beginners: Friendly, Stable, and Easy to Learn
by George Whittaker Introduction
Linux has long been known as the operating system of developers and power users, but today it’s far more accessible than ever before. Thanks to user-friendly distributions that prioritize simplicity, stability, and support, even someone who’s never used Linux can get up and running quickly. In this guide, we’ll explore some of the best Linux distributions (distros) for beginners, what sets them apart, and who each one is best suited for.
Whether you’re switching from Windows or macOS, using a PC for the first time, or simply curious about Linux, there’s a distro here that fits your comfort level and workflow.
1. Ubuntu: The Standard for New Users
Why it’s great: Ubuntu is one of the most recognizable Linux distributions, and for good reason. It offers a polished graphical interface, a massive community, and extensive documentation. If you’ve ever wanted a desktop that “just works,” Ubuntu delivers with minimal setup.
Key Features:
Intuitive GNOME desktop environment
Regular releases and a Long-Term Support (LTS) version with five years of updates
Large software repository and excellent hardware support
Strong community forums and extensive official documentation
Good for: Users completely new to Linux or those switching from Windows or macOS.
Best for: Desktops, laptops, beginners.
2. Linux Mint: Familiar Feel for Former Windows Users
Why it’s great: Linux Mint focuses on a familiar desktop experience. Its Cinnamon edition resembles the classic Windows layout, making the transition easier for users coming from that platform. Mint is stable, fast, and comes with many tools that simplify daily tasks.
Key Features:
Traditional desktop layout (like Windows)
Comes bundled with multimedia codecs and essential apps
Excellent performance on older hardware
Multiple desktop options (Cinnamon, MATE, Xfce)
Good for: Windows switchers looking for a gentle introduction.
Best for: Desktops, older machines, learners.
3. Zorin OS: A Windows-Like Experience With Style
Why it’s great: Zorin OS is designed with newcomers in mind. It’s polished, modern, and “comfortable” for users who may find traditional Linux desktops intimidating. Its interface can mimic Windows or macOS out of the box, and Zorin includes tools to effortlessly install popular applications.
Key Features:
Look-and-feel switcher (Windows, macOS styles)
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- What’s New in KDE Gear 25.12 — A Major Update for KDE Software
by George Whittaker Introduction
The KDE community has just published KDE Gear 25.12, the newest quarterly update to its suite of applications. This refresh brings a mix of enhancements, bug fixes, performance refinements, and new features across many popular KDE apps, from Dolphin file manager and Konsole terminal to Krita and Spectacle. With this release, KDE continues its tradition of incremental yet meaningful upgrades that make everyday use smoother and more productive.
KDE Gear updates are not limited to the KDE Plasma desktop; they also benefit users of other desktop environments who install KDE apps on their systems. Whether you’re running KDE on Linux, BSD, or even Windows via KDE Windows builds, Gear 25.12 delivers improvements worth checking out.
Highlights from KDE Gear 25.12Dolphin: Better File Browsing and Thumbnails
Dolphin, KDE’s file manager, receives several enhancements in this update:
Improved thumbnail generation for more file types, making previews quicker and more dependable.
UI polish in the sidebar for easier navigation between folders and mounted drives.
Better handling of network shares and remote locations, improving responsiveness and reducing hangs.
These changes combine to make everyday file exploration more responsive and visually informative.
Konsole: Productivity Boosts
The KDE terminal emulator, Konsole, gets attention too:
Search field improvements help you find text within long terminal scrollbacks faster and with fewer clicks.
Tab and session indicators are clearer, helping users manage multiple tabs or split views more easily.
Stability fixes reduce crashes in edge cases when closing multiple sessions at once.
For developers and power users who spend a lot of time in a terminal, these refinements are genuinely useful.
Krita: More Painting Power
Krita, KDE’s professional painting and illustration application, also benefits from this release:
Improvements to brush performance, reducing lag on large canvases and complex brush sets.
Better color management and palette handling, smoothing workflows for digital artists.
Fixes for certain configuration edge cases that previously caused settings not to persist across sessions.
Artists and digital illustrators should notice fewer interruptions and smoother performance when working on large projects.
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- Linux Kernel 5.4 Reaches End-of-Life: Time to Retire a Workhorse
by George Whittaker
One of the most widely deployed Linux kernels has officially reached the end of its lifecycle. The maintainers of the Linux kernel have confirmed that Linux 5.4, once a cornerstone of countless servers, desktops, and embedded devices, is now end-of-life (EOL). After years of long-term support, the branch has been retired and will no longer receive upstream fixes or security updates.
A Kernel Release That Defined a Generation of Linux Systems
When Linux 5.4 debuted, it made headlines for bringing native exFAT support, broader hardware compatibility, and performance improvements that many distributions quickly embraced. It became the foundation for major OS releases, including Ubuntu LTS, certain ChromeOS versions, Android kernels, and numerous appliance and IoT devices.
Its long support window made it a favorite for organizations seeking stability over bleeding-edge features.
What End-of-Life Actually Means
With the EOL announcement, the upstream kernel maintainers are officially done with version 5.4. That means:
No more security patches
No more bug fixes or performance updates
No regressions or vulnerabilities will be addressed
Some enterprise vendors may continue backporting patches privately, but the public upstream branch is now frozen. For most users, that makes 5.4 effectively unsafe to run.
Why This Matters for Users and Organizations
Many devices, especially embedded systems, tend to run kernels for much longer than desktops or servers. If those systems continue using 5.4, they now risk exposure to unpatched vulnerabilities.
Running an unsupported kernel can also create compliance issues for companies operating under strict security guidelines or certifications. Even home users running older LTS distributions may unknowingly remain on a kernel that’s no longer protected.
Upgrading Is the Clear Next Step
With 5.4 retired, users should begin planning an upgrade to a supported kernel line. Today’s active long-term support kernels include more modern branches such as 6.1, 6.6, and 6.8, which provide:
Better CPU and GPU support
Significant security improvements
Enhanced performance and energy efficiency
Longer future support windows
Before upgrading, organizations should test workloads, custom drivers, and hardware, especially with specialized or embedded deployments.
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- Linux Distros Designed for Former Windows Users Are Picking Up Steam
by George Whittaker
For years, Windows users frustrated with constant changes, aggressive updates, and growing system bloat have flirted with switching to Linux. But 2025 marks a noticeable shift: a new generation of Linux distributions built specifically for ex-Windows users is gaining real traction. One of the standout examples is Bazzite, a gaming-optimized Fedora-based distro that has quickly become a go-to choice for people abandoning Windows in favor of a cleaner, more customizable experience.
Why Many Windows Users Are Finally Jumping Ship
Microsoft’s ecosystem has been slowly pushing some users toward the exit. Hardware requirements for Windows 11 left millions of perfectly functional PCs behind. Ads on the Start menu and in system notifications have frustrated many. And for gamers, launcher problems, forced reboots and background processes that siphon resources have driven a search for alternatives.
Linux distributions have benefited from that frustration, especially those that focus on simplicity, performance and gaming readiness.
Gaming-First Distros Are Leading the Movement
Historically, switching to Linux meant sacrificing game compatibility. But with Valve’s Proton layer and Vulkan-based translation technologies, thousands of Windows games now run flawlessly, sometimes better than on Windows.
Distros targeting former Windows users are leaning into this new reality:
Seamless Steam integration
Automatic driver configuration for AMD, Intel and NVIDIA
Built-in performance overlays like MangoHUD
Proton GE and tools for modding or shader fixes
Support for HDR, VR and modern controller layouts
This means a new Linux user can install one of these distros and jump straight into gaming with almost no setup.
Bazzite: A Standout Alternative OS
Bazzite has become the poster child for this trend. Built on Fedora’s image-based system and the Universal Blue infrastructure, it offers an incredibly stable base that updates atomically, similar to SteamOS.
What makes Bazzite so attractive to Windows refugees?
Gaming-ready out of the box no tweaking, no driver hunts
Rock-solid performance thanks to an immutable system layout
Support for handheld PCs like the Steam Deck, ROG Ally and Legion Go
Friendly workflows that feel familiar to new Linux users
Customization without the risk of breaking the system
It’s no surprise that many “I switched to Linux!” posts now mention Bazzite as their distro of choice.
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- Linux Kernel 6.18 Is Out: What’s New and Important
by George Whittaker
The stable release of Linux Kernel 6.18 was officially tagged on November 30, 2025.
It’s expected to become this year’s major long-term support (LTS) kernel, something many users and distributions care about.
Here’s a breakdown of the most significant changes and improvements in this release:
Core Improvements: Performance, Memory, Infrastructure
The kernel’s memory allocation subsystem gets a major upgrade with “sheaves”, a per-CPU caching layer for slab allocations. This reduces locking overhead and speeds up memory allocation and freeing, improving overall system responsiveness.
A new device-mapper target dm-pcache arrives, enabling use of persistent memory (e.g. NVDIMM/CXL) as a cache layer for block devices, useful for systems with fast non-volatile memory, SSDs, or hybrid storage.
Overall memory management and swapping performance have been improved, which should help under memory pressure or heavy workloads.
Networking & Security Enhancements
Networking gets a boost: support for Accurate Explicit Congestion Notification (AccECN) in TCP, which can provide better congestion signals and more efficient network behaviour under load.
A new option for PSP-encrypted TCP connections has been added, a fresh attempt to push more secure transport-layer encryption (like a more efficient alternative to IPsec/TLS for some workloads) under kernel control.
The kernel now supports cryptographically signed BPF programs (eBPF), so BPF bytecode loaded at runtime can be verified for integrity. This is a noteworthy security hardening step.
The overall security infrastructure and auditing path, including multi-LSM (Linux Security Modules) support, has been refined, improving compatibility for setups using SELinux, AppArmor, or similar simultaneously.
Hardware, Drivers & Architecture Coverage
Kernel 6.18 brings enhanced hardware support: updated and new drivers for many platforms across architectures (x86_64, ARM, RISC-V, MIPS, etc.), including improvements for GPUs, CPU power management, storage controllers, and more.
In particular, support for newer SoCs, chipsets, and embedded-board device trees has been extended, beneficial for people using SBCs, ARM-based laptops/boards, or niche hardware.
For gaming rigs, laptops, and desktops alike: improvements to drivers, power-state management, and performance tuning may lead to better overall hardware efficiency.
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- Wine 10.19 Released: Game Changing Support for Windows Reparse Points on Linux
by George Whittaker Introduction
If you use Linux and occasionally run Windows applications, whether via native Wine or through gaming layers like Proton, you’ll appreciate what just dropped in Wine 10.19. Released November 14 2025, this version brings a major enhancement: official support for Windows reparse points, a filesystem feature many Windows apps rely on, and a host of other compatibility upgrades.
In simpler terms: Wine now understands more of the Windows filesystem semantics, which means fewer workarounds, better application compatibility, and smoother experiences for many games and tools previously finicky under Linux.
What Are Reparse Points & Why They MatterUnderstanding Reparse Points
On Windows, a reparse point is a filesystem object (file or directory) that carries additional data, often used for symbolic links, junctions, mount points, or other redirection features. When an application opens or queries a file, the OS may check the reparse tag to determine special behavior (for example “redirect this file open to this other path”).
Because many Windows apps, installers, games, DRM systems, file-managers, use reparse points for features like directory redirection, path abstractions, or filesystem overlays, lacking full support for them in Wine means those apps often misbehave.
What Wine 10.19 Adds
With Wine 10.19, support for these reparse point mechanisms has been implemented in key filesystem APIs: for example NtQueryDirectoryFile, GetFileInfo, file attribute tags, and DeleteFile/RemoveDirectory for reparse objects.
This means that in Wine 10.19:
Windows apps that create or manage symbolic links, directory junctions or mount-point style re-parsing will now function correctly in many more cases.
Installers or frameworks that rely on “when opening path X, redirect to path Y” will work with less tinkering.
Games or utilities that check for reparse tags or use directory redirections will have fewer “stuck” behaviors or missing files.
In effect, this is a step toward closer to native behavior for Windows file-system semantics under Linux.
Other Key Highlights in Wine 10.19
Beyond reparse points, the release brings several notable improvements:
Expanded support for WinRT exceptions (Windows Runtime error handling) meaning better compatibility for Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps and newer Windows-based frameworks.
Refactoring of “Common Controls” (COMCTL32) following the version 5 vs version 6 split, which helps GUI applications that rely on older controls or expect mixed versions.
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- Firefox 145: A Major Release with 32-Bit Linux Support Dropped
by George Whittaker Introduction
Mozilla has rolled out Firefox 145, a significant update that brings a range of usability, security and privacy enhancements, while marking a clear turning point by discontinuing official support for 32-bit Linux systems. For users on older hardware or legacy distros, this change means it’s time to consider moving to a 64-bit environment or opting for a supported version.
Here’s a detailed look at what’s new, what’s changed, and what you need to know.
Major Changes in Firefox 145End of 32-Bit Linux Builds
One of the headline items in this release is Mozilla’s decision to stop building and distributing Firefox for 32-bit x86 Linux. As per their announcement:
“32-bit Linux (on x86) is no longer widely supported by the vast majority of Linux distributions, and maintaining Firefox on this platform has become increasingly difficult and unreliable.”
From Firefox 145 onward, only 64-bit (x86_64) and relevant 64-bit architectures (such as ARM64) will be officially supported. For those still running 32-bit Linux builds, Mozilla recommends migrating to 64-bit or switching to the Extended Support Release (ESR) branch (Firefox 140 ESR) which still supports 32-bit for a limited period.
Usability & Interface Enhancements
Firefox 145 brings several improvements designed to make everyday web browsing smoother and more flexible:
PDF viewer enhancements: You can now add, edit, and delete comments in PDFs, and a comments sidebar helps you easily navigate your annotations.
Tab-group preview: When you hover over the name of a collapsed tab group, a thumbnail preview of the tabs inside appears, helpful for reorganizing or returning to work.
Access saved passwords from the sidebar, without needing to open a new tab or window.
“Open links from apps next to your active tab” setting: When enabled, links opened from external applications insert next to your current tab instead of at the end of the tab bar.
Slight UI refinements: Buttons, input fields, tabs and other elements get more rounded edges, horizontal tabs are redesigned to align with vertical-tab aesthetics.
Privacy, Security & Under-the-Hood Upgrades
Mozilla has also doubled down on privacy and risk reduction:
Fingerprinting defenses: Firefox 145 introduces new anti-fingerprinting techniques that Mozilla estimates reduce the number of users identified as unique by nearly half when Private Browsing mode or Enhanced Tracking Protection (strict) is used.
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- MX Linux 25 ‘Infinity’ Arrives: Debian 13 ‘Trixie’ Base, Modern Tools & A Fresh Installer
by George Whittaker Introduction
The team behind MX Linux has just released version 25, carrying the codename “Infinity”, and it brings a significant upgrade by building upon the stable base of Debian 13 “Trixie”. Released on November 9, 2025, this edition doesn’t just refresh the desktop, it introduces modernized tooling, updated kernels, dual init-options, and installer enhancements aimed at both newcomers and long-time users.
In the sections that follow, we’ll walk through the key new features of MX Linux 25, what’s changed for each desktop edition, recommended upgrade or fresh-install paths, and why this release matters in the wider Linux-distribution ecosystem.
What’s New in MX Linux 25 “Infinity”
Here are the headline changes and improvements that define this release:
Debian 13 “Trixie” Base
By moving to Debian 13, Infinity inherits all the stability, security updates, and broader hardware support of the latest Debian stable release. The base system now aligns with Trixie’s libraries, kernels, and architecture support.
Kernel Choices & Hardware Support
The standard editions ship with the Linux 6.12 LTS kernel series, offering a solid baseline for most hardware.
For newer hardware or advanced users, the “AHS” (Advanced Hardware Support) variants and the KDE Plasma edition adopt a Liquorix-flavored Linux 6.16 (or 6.15 in some variants) kernel, maximizing performance and compatibility with cutting-edge setups.
Dual Init Option: systemd and SysVinit
Traditionally associated with lighter-weight init options, MX Linux now offers both systemd by default and SysVinit editions (particularly for Xfce and Fluxbox variants). This gives users the freedom to choose their init system preference without losing new features.
Updated Desktop Environments
Xfce edition: Ships with Xfce 4.20. Improvements include a revamped Whisker Menu, updated archive management tools (Engrampa replacing File Roller in some editions).
KDE Plasma edition: Uses KDE Plasma 6.3.6, defaults to Wayland for a modern session experience (with X11 still optionally available), adds root-actions and service menus to Dolphin, and switches TLP out for power-profiles-daemon to resolve power widget issues.
Fluxbox edition: Offers a more minimal, highly customizable environment: new panel layouts, updated “appfinder” configs for Rofi, toolbar changes and themes refined. Defaults the audio player to Audacious (instead of the older DeaDBeeF).
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- Arch Linux November 2025 ISO: Fresh Snapshot, Smarter Installer (Archinstall 3.0.12) & Pacman 7.1
by George Whittaker
Arch Linux has shipped its November 2025 ISO snapshot (2025.11.01), and while Arch remains a rolling distribution, these monthly images are a big deal, especially for new installs, labs, and homelab deployments. This time, the ISO lands alongside two important pieces:
Archinstall 3.0.12 – a more polished, smarter TUI installer
Pacman 7.1 – a package manager update with stricter security and better tooling
If you’ve been thinking about spinning up a fresh Arch box, or you’re curious what changed under the hood, this release is a very nice jumping-on point.
Why Arch Still Ships Monthly ISOs in a Rolling World
Arch is famous for its “install once, update forever” model. Technically, you could install from a two-year-old image and just run:
sudo pacman -Syu
…but in practice, that’s painful:
Huge initial update downloads
Possible breakage jumping across many months of changes
Outdated installer tooling
That’s why the project publishes a monthly snapshot ISO: it rolls all current packages into a fresh image so you:
Start with a current kernel and userland
Spend less time updating right after install
Get the latest Archinstall baked in (or just a pacman -Sy archinstall away)
The 2025.11.01 ISO is exactly that: Arch as of early November 2025, ready to go.
What’s Inside the November 2025 ISO (2025.11.01)
The November snapshot doesn’t introduce new features by itself, it’s a frozen image of current Arch, but a few details are worth calling out:
Ships with a Linux 6.17.x kernel, including improved AMD/Intel GPU support and updated Btrfs bits.
Includes all the usual base packages plus current toolchains, drivers, and desktop stacks from the rolling repos.
The image is intended only for new installs; existing Arch systems should keep using pacman -Syu for upgrades.
You can download it from the official Arch Linux download page or via BitTorrent mirrors.
One small twist: the ISO itself still ships with Archinstall 3.0.11, but 3.0.12 was released the same day – so we’ll grab the newer version from the repos before running the installer.
Archinstall 3.0.12: What’s Actually New?
Archinstall has evolved from “nice experiment” to “pretty solid way to install Arch” if you don’t want to script everything yourself. Version 3.0.12 is a refinement release focused on stability, storage, and bootloader logic.
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