Ceci est une ancienne révision du document !
Lunatik: 22/04/2024
The Lunatik project is developing tools that allow you to use the Lua language to extend the functionality of the Linux kernel and quickly write handler scripts that run at kernel level. A Lua interpreter is used, to execute the code, modified to work at the kernel level. The project code is written in C and is distributed under the MIT license.
Among the capabilities of the command line utility are commands for loading, unloading and reloading Lunatik modules in the kernel, displaying the status of loaded modules, viewing a list of scripts running in the kernel, running scripts, creating and stopping Lua runtime environments in the kernel, using the interactive shell REPL (Read –Eval–Print Loop). The project also provides a set of examples to evaluate the capabilities of Lunatik.
https://github.com/luainkernel/lunatik
Release of EdgeDB 5.0: 22/04/2024
A release of the EdgeDB 5.0, DBMS is available, which implements the relational graph data model and the EdgeQL query language, optimized for complex hierarchical data. The project is developed in the form of an add-on for PostgreSQL, it is written in Python and Rust (parser and performance-critical parts), and is distributed under the Apache 2.0 license. Client libraries are prepared for Python, Go, Rust, .NET, Elixir and TypeScript/Javascript. It also provides command line tools for DBMS management and interactive query execution (REPL).
https://github.com/edgedb/edgedb/releases/tag/v5.0
Release of Audacity 3.5: 22/04/2024
A new release of the free sound editor Audacity 3.5, has been published, providing tools for editing sound files (Ogg Vorbis, FLAC, MP3 and WAV), recording and digitizing sound, changing sound file parameters, overlaying tracks and applying effects (for example, noise reduction, changing tempo and tone ). Audacity 3.5 was the fifth major release since the project was taken over by Muse Group. The Audacity code is licensed under GPLv3, with binary builds available for Linux, Windows and macOS.
https://www.audacityteam.org/blog/audacity-3-5/
NetBSD 9.4 released: 23/04/2024
The NetBSD 9.4 operating system has been published, which completed the maintenance cycle of the previous major branch 9.x. NetBSD 9.4 is categorized as a maintenance update and primarily includes fixes for issues and vulnerabilities identified since NetBSD 9.3 was published in August 2022. For those who value new functionality, a major release was recently released, NetBSD 10.0. Installation images of 507 MB in size have been prepared for download, available in builds for 57 system architectures and 16 different CPU families.
In addition to bug fixes in NetBSD 9.4, some new features, usually related to hardware support, have been moved from the NetBSD 10 branch. For example, support has been added for new MegaRAID controllers, Ethernet cards on the RTL8168GU chip and 3G modems ZTE MF112 and D-Link DWM222. Support for new AMD (zen3, zen4) and Intel CPUs (Comet Lake, Skylake-X, Cascade Lake) has been expanded. Added support for RAM disks in ZFS and CGD. Improved compatibility with QEMU assemblies for aarch64.
https://www.netbsd.org/releases/formal-9/NetBSD-9.4.html
Release of Nmap 7.95: 23/04/2024
The network security scanner Nmap 7.95 has been released. It is designed to conduct a network audit and identify active network services. The project code is supplied under the NPSL (Nmap Public Source License), based on the GPLv2 license, which is supplemented with recommendations (not requirements) for using the OEM licensing program and purchasing a commercial license if the manufacturer does not want to open the code of his product in accordance with the requirements of the copyleft license or intends to integrate Nmap into products that are not GPL compliant.
The terms of the NPSL license apply only to parties who accept the license in exchange for receiving special rights, such as the right to redistribute Nmap. In this case, the participating party can do whatever it wants under copyright provisions such as fair use, and the Nmap developers will not try to control their work.
Release of the Fedora Linux 40: 23/04/2024
Fedora 40 Workstation , Fedora Server , Fedora CoreOS , Fedora Cloud Base, Fedora IoT Edition and Live builds are available for download, delivered as spins with desktop environments, like KDE Plasma, Xfce, MATE, Cinnamon, LXDE, Phosh, LXQt, Budgie and Sway. Builds are generated for x86_64, Power64 and ARM64 (AArch64) architectures. The publication of Fedora Silverblue build is delayed.
https://fedoramagazine.org/announcing-fedora-linux-40/
Nginx 1.26.0 released with HTTP/3 support: 23/04/2024
After a year of development, a new stable branch of the high-performance HTTP server and multi-protocol proxy server nginx 1.26.0 has been published, which incorporates the changes accumulated in the main branch 1.25.x. In the future, all changes in the stable branch 1.26 will be related to the elimination of serious errors and vulnerabilities. Soon the main branch of nginx 1.27 will be formed, where the development of new features will continue. For ordinary users who do not have the task of ensuring compatibility with third-party modules, they recommend you use the main branch, where releases of the commercial product Nginx Plus are formed every three months.
https://mailman.nginx.org/pipermail/nginx-announce/2024/EJFW6YFMCUODWQN7DZKIEKUTHKYXVZT2.html
Release of TrueNAS SCALE 24.04: 24/04/2024
iXsystems has published the TrueNAS SCALE 24.04 distribution, which uses the Linux kernel and Debian (the company's previous products, including TrueOS, PC-BSD, TrueNAS and FreeNAS, were based on FreeBSD). Like TrueNAS CORE (FreeNAS), TrueNAS SCALE is free to download and use. The iso image size is 1.5 GB. The source code of TrueNAS SCALE-specific build scripts, web interface and layers are published on GitHub.
The Linux-based TrueNAS SCALE edition is now the main edition, and the FreeBSD-based TrueNAS CORE branch has been placed in maintenance mode, where they plan to fix bugs and security issues for many years to come. New features and new versions of components will be developed only in the TrueNAS SCALE branch. TrueNAS SCALE is not the only Linux-based FreeNAS option - in 2009, the OpenMediaVault distribution separated from FreeNAS, which was transferred to the Linux kernel and Debian.
https://www.truenas.com/blog/truenas-scale-dragonfish-release/
Release of QEMU 9.0.0: 24/04/2024
As an emulator, QEMU allows you to run a program compiled for one hardware platform on a system with a completely different architecture, for example, run an ARM application on an x86-compatible PC. In virtualization mode in QEMU, the performance of code execution in an isolated environment is close to the hardware system due to the direct execution of instructions on the CPU and the use of the Xen hypervisor or the KVM module in Linux, or the NVMM module in NetBSD.
The project was originally created by Fabrice Bellard to provide the ability to run Linux executables compiled for the x86 platform on non-x86 architectures. Over the years of development, support for full emulation was added for 14 hardware architectures, the number of emulated hardware devices exceeded 400. In preparing version 9.0, more than 2,700 changes were made from 220 developers.
https://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/qemu-devel/2024-04/msg03263.html
Pale Moon browser 33.1.0: 24/04/2024
Pale Moon 33.1.0, branching from the Firefox code base to provide higher performance, preserve the classic interface, minimize memory consumption and provide additional customization options, is out. Pale Moon builds are created for Windows and Linux (x86_64). The project code is distributed under the MPLv2 (Mozilla Public License).
The project adheres to the classic interface layout, without switching to the Australis and Photon interfaces integrated into Firefox 29 and 57, and with extensive customization options. The removed components include DRM, Social API, WebRTC, PDF viewer, Crash Reporter, code for collecting statistics, tools for parental controls and people with disabilities. Compared to Firefox, support for extensions using XUL has been returned to the browser, and the ability to use both full-fledged and lightweight themes has been retained.
https://forum.palemoon.org/viewtopic.php?t%3D31085%26p%3D251221%23p251221
Release of Proxmox VE 8.2: 24/04/2024
Proxmox Virtual Environment 8.2 has been published, a specialized Linux distribution based on Debian GNU/Linux, aimed at deploying and maintaining virtual servers using LXC and KVM, and capable of acting as a replacement for products such as VMware vSphere, Microsoft Hyper-V and Citrix Hypervisor. The size of the installation iso image is 1.3 GB.
Proxmox VE provides the means to deploy a turnkey, web-based, industrial-grade virtual server system designed to manage hundreds or even thousands of virtual machines. The distribution has built-in tools for organizing backups of virtual environments and clustering support available out of the box, including the ability to migrate virtual environments from one node to another without stopping work. Features of the web interface include: support for a secure VNC console; control access to all available objects (VM, storage, nodes, etc.) based on roles; support for various authentication mechanisms (MS ADS, LDAP, Linux PAM, Proxmox VE authentication).
https://forum.proxmox.com/threads/proxmox-ve-8-2-released.145722/ Nextcloud Hub 8 introduced: 25/04/2024
Nextcloud Hub 8, providing a self-sufficient solution for collaboration between enterprise employees and teams developing various projects, is available for download. At the same time, Nextcloud 29, which underlies Nextcloud Hub, was published, allowing the deployment of cloud storage with support for synchronization and data exchange, providing the ability to view and edit data from any device anywhere on the network (using a web interface or WebDAV). The Nextcloud server can be deployed on any hosting that supports the execution of PHP scripts and provides access to SQLite, MariaDB/MySQL or PostgreSQL. Nextcloud source code is distributed under the AGPL license.
In terms of the tasks it solves, Nextcloud Hub resembles Google Docs and Microsoft 365, but allows you to deploy a fully controlled collaboration infrastructure that operates on your own servers and is not tied to external cloud services. Nextcloud Hub combines several open add-on applications on the Nextcloud cloud platform into a single environment, allowing you to collaborate with office documents, files and information to plan tasks and events. The platform also includes add-ons for accessing email, messaging, video conferencing and chats.
https://nextcloud.com/blog/nextcloud-hub8/
Release of Ubuntu 24.04 LTS: 25/04/2024
Ubuntu 24.04 “Noble Numbat” is out, which is classified as a long-term support (LTS) release, updates will be generated for 12 years (5 years - publicly available, plus another 7 years for users of the Ubuntu Pro service). Installation images are created for Ubuntu Desktop, Ubuntu Server, Lubuntu, Kubuntu, Ubuntu Mate, Ubuntu Budgie, Ubuntu Studio, Xubuntu, UbuntuKylin, Ubuntu Unity, Edubuntu and Ubuntu Cinnamon .
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-announce/2024-April/000301.html
Release of OSMC 2024.04-1: 27/04/2024
OSMC 2024.04-1, designed for creating a media center based on Raspberry Pi single-board computers or Vero set-top boxes developed by the distribution's developers, is out. The distribution is equipped with the Kodi media center and offers out of the box a complete set of tools for creating a home theater that supports video display in 4K, 2K and HD (1080p) quality. Two images are available for download; for direct recording to a USB drive or SD card, as well as specialized installers for Windows, macOS and Linux, allowing a novice user to install the distribution. Ready-made builds are created for Raspberry Pi 2, 3, 3+, Zero W 2, 4 and 400 boards, as well as for Vero 4K, 4K+ and V set-top boxes.
The distribution is based on Debian and supports installing packages from standard repositories. When working with the distribution, no knowledge of Linux is required; all configuration operations are performed through a graphical interface. The Raspberry Pi-based media center is proposed to be connected to the TV via the HDMI port and powered via the USB port, which is available on some TVs. Video playback uses hardware video decoding provided by the Broadcom VideoCore graphics accelerator.
https://osmc.tv/2024/04/osmcs-april-update-is-here-with-kodi-v20-5/
The Genode project has published Sculpt 24.04: 27/04/2024
The release of the Sculpt 24.04 project was announced, that is developing an operating system based on Genode OS Framework technologies, which can be used by ordinary users to perform everyday tasks. The source code of the project is distributed under the AGPLv3 license. A LiveUSB image of 30 MB in size is offered for download . It supports operation on systems with Intel processors and graphics with VT-d and VT-x extensions enabled, as well as on ARM systems with VMM extensions.
https://genode.org/news/sculpt-os-release-24.04
Web browser Min 1.32: 27/04/2024
A new version of the browser, Min 1.32 , has been published. It offers a minimalistic interface built around manipulation of the address bar. The browser is created using the Electron platform, which allows you to create stand-alone applications based on the Chromium engine and the Node.js platform. The Min interface is written in JavaScript, CSS and HTML. The code is distributed under the Apache 2.0 license. Builds are created for Linux, macOS and Windows.
The central control in Min is the address bar, through which you can send queries to a search engine (DuckDuckGo by default) and search the current page. As you type in the address bar, a summary of relevant information for the current request is generated, such as a link to a Wikipedia article, a selection from bookmarks and browsing history, as well as recommendations from the DuckDuckGo search engine. Each page opened in the browser is indexed and becomes available for subsequent search in the address bar. In the address bar you can also enter commands to quickly perform operations (for example, “!settings” - go to settings, “!screenshot” - create a screenshot, “!clearhistory” - clear your browsing history, etc.).
https://github.com/minbrowser/min/releases/tag/v1.32.0
Release of ncurses 6.5: 28/04/2024
After a year and a half of development, the ncurses 6.5 library has been released. It is designed for creating multi-platform interactive console user interfaces and supporting emulation of the curses programming interface from System V Release 4.0 (SVr4). The ncurses 6.5 release is source compatible with the ncurses 5.x and 6.0 branches, but extends the ABI. Popular applications built using ncurses include aptitude, lynx, mutt, ncftp, vim, vifm, minicom, mosh, screen, tmux, emacs, less.
https://www.mail-archive.com/info-gnu@gnu.org/msg03279.html
Release of EndeavourOS 24.04: 28/04/2024
The EndeavorOS 24.04 project is presented, which replaced the Antergos distribution, which was stopped in May 2019 due to the lack of free time among the remaining maintainers to maintain the project at the proper level. The installation image size is 2.7 GB (x86_64).
Endeavor OS allows the user to easily install Arch Linux with the required desktop, as intended by the desktop's original developers, without additional pre-installed programs. The distribution offers a simple installer for installing a basic Arch Linux environment with the default KDE desktop and the ability to install from the repository one of the standard desktops based on Mate, LXQt, Cinnamon, Xfce, GNOME, Budgie, as well as i3, BSPWM and Sway mosaic window managers. Work is underway to add support for Qtile and Openbox window managers, UKUI , LXDE and Deepin desktops. One of the project developers is developing its own window manager named Worm.
Release of Amarok 3.0.0: 29/04/2024
Six years after the last release, the Amarok 3.0.0 music player, which was very popular during the KDE 3 and KDE 4, was announced. The release is only available as source code. Amarok 3.0.0 was the first to be ported to the Qt5 and the KDE Frameworks 5 library. The project code is written in C++ and distributed under the GPLv2 license.
Amarok provides a three-panel mode of displaying information (collection, current composition and playlist), it allows you to navigate through the music collection, tags and individual catalogs, it supports dynamic playlists and quickly create your own playlists, it can automatically generate recommendations, statistics and rating of popular compositions, supports downloading lyrics, covers and information about compositions from various services, allows you to automatically generate recommendations, scripts and information messages about the script.
https://invent.kde.org/multimedia/amarok
Release of Shotcut 24.04: 29/04/2024
A new release of Shotcut 24.04 video editor, which is being developed by the author of the MLT project and uses this framework to organize video editing, is available. Support for video and sound formats are implemented via FFmpeg. It is possible to use plugins with video and audio effects, compatible with Frei0r and LADSPA. Features of Shotcut include, multi-track editing with the layout of video from fragments in various source formats, without the need for them to be imported or recoding. There are built-in tools for creating screencasts, processing images from a web camera and receiving streaming video. Qt is used to build the interface. The code is written in C++ and distributed under the GPLv3 license. Ready-made builds are available for Linux (AppImage, flatpak and snap), macOS and Windows.
https://shotcut.org/blog/new-release-240428/
Lennart Pottering introduces run0: 29/04/2024
Lennart Pottering introduced the run0 utility, which allows you to perform actions/processes under the identifiers of other users. The new utility is positioned as a safer replacement of the sudo program, implemented in the form of a superstructure over the systemd-run command and allows you to get rid of the use of the executable file with the SUID flag. The run0 utility is included in the release systemd 256, which is currently at the stage of release candidate.
It is noted that the change of the identifier using the SUID flag in sudo involves additional risks associated with the fact that the SUID-process inherits the context of execution, including many properties controlled by an unprivileged user, environment variables, file descriptors, planner parameters and cgroup binding. Part of these properties are automatically cleaned for SUID processes by the core, and part by the application itself. However, in complex SUID programs such as sudo, people continue to regularly find vulnerabilities caused by inaccurate handling of external data that an unprivileged user can influence.
In run0, instead of using SUID, you are contacting a system manager requesting a command shell or process with the specified user ID, creating a new pseudo-terminal (PTY) and sending data between it and the current terminal (TTY). This behavior is more like a launch using ssh than performing using the classic sudo. The privileged process is triggered in an isolated context, which is generated by the PID 1 process rather than the user's process, i.e. does not inherit the properties of the user's environment, except for the flow of the $TERM environment variable.
Polkit is used to authorize and determine the user's capabilities in run0. The classical rule description language (/etc/sudoers) used in sudo is not supported. The functionality for running programs with other privileges is built into the systemd-run, and the run0 command is created as a symbolic link to the systemd-run, when using which a command line interface is provided.
Additional features of run0 include, an indication of increased privileges through the installation of a reddish background in the terminal and the addition of a red point to the window header. After cessation of execution with other privileges, the point disappears, and the background changes to normal. In addition, run0 supports all “systemd-run” options, for example, the parameter “–property,” through which you can set arbitrary settings of the systemd services (for example, “CPUWeight-200 MemoryMax-2G IPAccounting-yes”).
https://mastodon.social/@pid_eins/112353324518585654
Release of meta-distribution T2 SDE 24.5: 30/04/2024
The T2 SDE 24.5 meta-distribution has been released, providing an environment for creating your own distributions, cross-compiling and keeping package versions up to date. Distributions can be created based on Linux, Minix, MinGW, macOS, Haiku and BSD systems. Popular distributions built on the T2 system include Puppy Linux. The project provides basic bootable iso images with a minimal graphical environment in versions with the Musl, uClibc and Glibc libraries. More than 5,000 packages are available for assembly.
The release provides support for 25 hardware architectures: Alpha, Arc, ARM(64), Avr32, HPPA(64), IA64, Loongarch64, M68k, Microblaze, MIPS(64), Nios2, OpenRISC, PowerPC(64), RISCV(64) , s390x, SPARC(64), SuperH, i486, i686, x86-64 and x32, for which 36 ISO images are generated (for some architectures, several build options are supported using Glibc, Musl or uClibc). Most architectures retain the ability to boot into environments with 512 MB of RAM.
https://www.mail-archive.com/t2@t2-project.org/msg04077.html
Release of OpenTofu 1.7: 01/05/2024
A new release of the OpenTofu 1.7 project has been presented, which continues the development of the open code base of the configuration management platform and automation of, maintaining the Terraform infrastructure . The development of OpenTofu is carried out under the auspices of the Linux Foundation using an open management model with the participation of a community formed from companies and enthusiasts interested in the project ( 161 companies and 792 individual developers have announced support for the project). The project code is written in Go and distributed under the MPL 2.0 license.
The fork was created in response to HashiCorp moving its products to a proprietary BSL 1.1 license, which restricts the use of code in cloud systems that compete with HashiCorp products and services. The change in license is explained by the desire to maintain funding for their developments in the face of the inability of classical licensing models to resist the parasitism of companies using ready-made open source codes of HashiCorp developments to create their own commercial cloud products without participating in joint development.
The platform can be used to build, modify and version infrastructure in accordance with the concept of infrastructure as code, in which the configuration of systems is described in a high-level domain-specific language and processed in a similar way to code. OpenTofu supports the construction of a resource graph that defines all connections between resources to effectively parallelize operations on resources and make changes based on dependencies.
OpenTofu also allows you to generate an Execution Plan based on a given configuration, which allows one to evaluate actions with the infrastructure before they are actually applied to the infrastructure. Complex changes to the infrastructure can be made automatically, with minimal administrator involvement, which avoids many errors caused by humans. At the same time, the administrator can fully monitor what exactly will be changed and in what order, using the provided execution plan and resource graph.
https://opentofu.org/blog/opentofu-1-7-0/
Release of LibreELEC 12.0: 02/05/2024
LibreELEC 12.0, that develops a fork of OpenELEC, is out. The user interface is based on the Kodi media center. Images have been prepared for loading from a USB drive or SD card (32- and 64-bit x86, Raspberry Pi 2/3/4/5, various devices on Rockchip, Allwinner, NXP and Amlogic chips). Build size for x86_64 architecture is 247 MB.
With LibreELEC you can turn any computer into a media center. The basic principle of the distribution is “everything just works”; to get a completely ready-to-use environment, you just need to load LibreELEC from a Flash drive. The user does not need to worry about keeping the system up to date - the distribution uses a system for automatically downloading and installing updates, activated when connected to the internet. It is possible to expand the functionality of the distribution through a system of add-ons that are installed from a separate repository developed by the project developers.
In addition to the standard Kodi capabilities, the distribution provides a number of additional functions aimed at maximizing simplification of operation. For example, a special configuration add-on is being developed that allows you to configure network connection parameters, manage LCD screen settings, and allow or disable automatic installation of updates. Also provided are features, such as using a remote control (control is possible both via infrared and via Bluetooth), file sharing (Samba server is built-in), built-in BitTorrent client Transmission, automatic search and connection of local and external drives.
https://libreelec.tv/2024/05/01/libreelec-nexus-12-0-0/
Release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4: 02/05/2024
Ready-made installation images are available for registered users of the Red Hat Customer Portal (you can also use CentOS Stream 9 iso images and free RHEL builds for developers to evaluate functionality ). The release is designed for x86_64, s390x (IBM System z), ppc64le and Aarch64 (ARM64) architectures.
The RHEL 9 branch is being developed with a more open development process and uses the CentOS Stream 9 package base as its base. CentOS Stream is positioned as an upstream project for RHEL, giving third-party participants the opportunity to control the preparation of packages for RHEL, propose their changes and influence decisions made. In accordance with the 10-year support cycle for the distribution, RHEL 9 will be supported until 2032.
The source code of RHEL 9.4 rpm packages are not posted in the public repository git.centos.org and are provided to the company's clients only through a closed section of the site, which has a user agreement (EULA) prohibiting the redistribution of data, which does not allow the use of these packages to create derivative distributions. The sources remain available in the CentOS Stream repository, but it is not completely synchronized with RHEL and the latest versions of packages do not always match the packages from RHEL. Rocky Linux, Oracle and SUSE reproduce the source rpm packages of RHEL releases as part of the OpenELA project
KDE has removed the ability to install GNOME icon themes: 04/05/2024
Nate Graham, QA developer for the KDE project, has published a report on preparations for the KDE Plasma 6.1 release scheduled for June 18th, as well as the maintenance release 6.0.5 scheduled for May 21st. “This week we put some of the final Plasma 6.0 bugs to rest, and continued working towards Plasma 6.1 with a variety of UI improvements. Nothing ground-breaking this week, just a slow grind of useful work towards a solid release!”
https://pointieststick.com/2024/05/03/this-week-in-kde-looking-towards-plasma-6-1/
The TSAC audio codec: 04/05/2024
Fabrice Bellard, who founded the QEMU, FFmpeg, BPG, QuickJS, TinyGL and TinyCC projects, published the TSAC audio encoding format and associated tools for compressing and decompressing audio files. The format is focused on transmitting data at very low bitrates, for example, 5.5 kb/s for mono and 7.5 kb/s for stereo, while maintaining acceptable quality of music and speech. Using TSAC allows you to pack a musical composition with a duration of 3.5 minutes and a sampling frequency of 44.1 kHz (stereo) into a 192 KB file, which will be almost indistinguishable from the original to the ear of an inexperienced layman. It is stated that the project's code is distributed under the MIT license, but the source code is not currently offered for download.
The basis for the creation of TSAC was the Descript audio codec, which was expanded to support stereo sound and transferred to the use of another machine learning model based on a neural network with a “ transformer ” architecture, which made it possible to increase the compression ratio by reconstructing lost details taking into account the model of human auditory perception. The model occupies about 200 MB in compressed form and is formatted in a deterministic representation, which guarantees the same result regardless of the CPU/GPU used and the number of threads involved in the calculations
https://bellard.org/tsac/readme.txt
Dillo 3.1 has been published: 05/05/2024
The release of the minimalistic web browser Dillo 3.1 , written in C/C++ using the FLTK library, has been published. The browser is characterized by its small size (the executable file is about a megabyte when assembled statically) and minimal memory consumption, with a graphical interface with support for tabs and bookmarks, support for HTTPS and a basic set of web standards (there is support for HTML 4.01 and CSS, but no JavaScript). Dillo's functionality can be extended through plugins, for example there are plugins for the IPFS and Gemini protocols. The project code is distributed under the GPLv3 license.
The last major release of Dillo 3.0.0 was published in 2011, and the last corrective update 3.0.5 in 2015. In 2016, one of the key developers of the project died, then in 2017 the development of Dillo completely stopped, and in 2022 the payment period for the project domain expired and the site dillo.org ceased to exist. In January 2024, an attempt was made to revive the project, the results of which are presented as part of Dillo 3.1. A fork of Dillo+ (Dillo-Plus) was also created in 2023 , which included the backlog of fixes (the last change to Dillo-Plus was added two months ago).
https://dillo-browser.github.io/latest.html
Release of GIMP 2.10.38: 06/05/2024
The graphics editor GIMP 2.10.38, has a new version. Packages for installation have been published in flatpak format (a package in snap format will also be prepared in the near future). The release includes bug fixes and minor improvements. It is noted that the transfer of new features to the 2.10 branch has been stopped, and all efforts to increase functionality are focused on preparing the GIMP 3 branch, which is frozen before release and at the final stage of preparing a release candidate. It is likely that GIMP 2.10.38 will be the last release in the 2.10 branch, but it is possible that after the release of GIMP 3.0.0 another release of GIMP 2.10.40 will see the light of day, containing only bug fixes.
https://www.gimp.org/news/2024/05/05/gimp-2-10-38-released/
Release of PeerTube 6.1: 06/05/2024
A new release of a decentralized platform for video hosting and video broadcasting PeerTube 6.1 is out. PeerTube offers a vendor-neutral alternative to YouTube, Dailymotion and Vimeo, using a content distribution network based on P2P communications and linking visitors' browsers together. The project's code is distributed under the AGPLv3 license.
https://joinpeertube.org/news/release-6.1
The GNOME Project has published its financial report for 2023: 08/05/2024
The GNOME Foundation has published its financial report for fiscal year, 2023. It covers figures from October 2022 to September 2023. The report also mentions the main events of this period (releases GNOME 44 and 45 , the appointment of a new director) and developer conferences held (GUADEC 2023 in Riga, GNOME Asia 2022 in Kuala Lumpur, Linux App Summit in Brno).
As for financial indicators, expenses for the reporting period significantly exceeded the receipt of funds - $556 thousand were received, $676 thousand were spent ($120 thousand from previous savings). It is worth noting that overspending was also observed in previous periods: in 2022, the project received $363 thousand and spent $649 thousand (overspend of $286 thousand), in 2021 the project received $287 thousand and spent $927 thousand (overspend of $640 thousand), in In 2020, the project received $925 thousand and spent $789 thousand (balance $136 thousand), in 2019 the project received $915 thousand and spent $608 thousand (balance $307 thousand), in 2018 the project received $1.073 million and spent $365 thousand (balance $708 thousand). In November 2023, the project also received a million euros from a Sovereign fund.
As for the sources of funds in 2023, of the $556 thousand received, $422 thousand are related to donations and sponsorships, $47 thousand are earned through conferences, $80 thousand are related to the GIMP project. Expenditures include $283,000 for conferences, $105,000 for support and infrastructure, $96,000 for Outreach, $30,000 for GIMP, $121,000 for administrative expenses, and $39,000 for other projects.
https://foundation.gnome.org/2024/05/07/2023-annual-report/
Release of pacstall 5.0: 08/05/2024
A new release of the package manager pacstall 5.0 is available, that develops an analogue of the AUR concept for Ubuntu Linux and its own repository, which contains 518 packages that allow you to install the latest versions of programs of interest in the current Ubuntu environment, in parallel with the programs available in the system. Packages are in pacscript format, similar to PKGBUILD in the AUR and also include download, dependency, build, and installation information. The utility code is written in the Shell and distributed under the GPLv3 license.
https://github.com/pacstall/pacstall/releases
Release of Nebula 1.9: 09/05/2024
A new release of the Nebula project has been published, offering tools for building secure overlay networks that allow you to combine geographically separated hosts into a separate isolated network on the internet. The project is designed to create your own overlay networks for any need, for example, to combine corporate computers in different offices, servers in different data centers or virtual environments from different cloud providers. The code is written in Go and distributed under the MIT license. The project was founded by Slack, which develops a corporate messenger of the same name. Supports Linux, FreeBSD, macOS, Windows, iOS and Android.
Nodes in the Nebula network communicate directly with each other in P2P mode - direct VPN connections are dynamically created as data needs to be transferred between nodes. The identity of each host on the network is confirmed by a digital certificate, and connecting to the network requires authentication - each user receives a certificate confirming the IP address in the Nebula network, name and membership in host groups. Certificates are signed by an internal certification center, deployed by the creator of each individual network at its own facilities and used to certify the authority of hosts that have the right to connect to a specific overlay network tied to that certification center.
https://github.com/slackhq/nebula/releases/tag/v1.9.0
Daphile 24.05: 09/05/2024
The Daphile 24.05 distribution was released, It based on Gentoo Linux and designed to create a system for storing and playing a music collection that can be replaced on a computer without a screen. (headless) Playback and collection management is done through a specially created web interface. A build with a regular Linux kernel ( 329 MB ) and a build with real-time components ( 319 MB ) are available for download.
The distribution can operate as a sound server, network storage (NAS, Network-Attached Storage) and wireless access point. Playback from internal drives, network streaming services and external USB drives is supported. To ensure maximum sound quality and create multi-zone audio systems, you can connect your Daphile computer to analog amplifiers via digital-to-analog converters with a USB interface.
Release of Xpra 6.0: 10/05/2024
A new release of the Xpra project has been published. it is developing a similar app to screen and tmux utilities for working with graphical applications. Xpra allows you to run X11 applications on a local or remote system, disconnect a session without terminating programs, and return to working with applications after some time or continue working from another host (you can start working with a program on one machine and continue on another). For example, Xpra allows you to run a graphical application on an external Linux server and display the content on the screen of the current workstation running Linux, Windows or macOS. The project code is written in Python and is distributed under the GPLv2+ license.
You can both connect to existing desktop sessions and create new sessions with graphical Linux programs in Windows and macOS environments. Moreover, Xpra has a built-in HTML5 client that allows you to connect to sessions through a browser. In addition to access to windows, Xpra supports many related desktop features, such as broadcasting sound to a remote system, forwarding printers and web cameras , access to the clipboard, supporting synchronization of the system tray state and notifications . There are built-in functions for transferring and synchronizing files between systems.
https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/releases/tag/v6.0
The gittuf project is at 0.4: 10/05/2024
A new release of the gittuf 0.4 project is available, that develops a hierarchical system for verifying the contents of Git repositories, allowing to minimize the risks in a situation of compromise of individual developers with access to the repository. Gittuf provides an additional layer of security to Git and a set of utilities for managing the keys of all developers who have access to the repository, and setting rules for accessing branches, tags and individual files. The project code is written in Go and distributed under the Apache 2.0 license. The project is at the stage of active development and has an alpha release quality, suitable for experimentation, but not yet ready for production implementation.
The gittuf verification model is based on a hierarchical trust propagation system. The root of trust belongs to the owner of the repository, who can generate keys for development participants and define the rules to govern the generated keys. Gittuf allows you to create flexible granular rules that define the permissions of each developer and the area of the repository in which they can make changes. For example, a developer may be authorized to create tags, make changes to specific branches, or change only individual files in the repository.
https://github.com/gittuf/gittuf/releases/tag/v0.4.0
Release of EuroLinux 9.4: 11/05/2024
A new release of EuroLinux took place, prepared by rebuilding the source code of the packages of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4, completely binary compatible with it. The changes boil down to rebranding and removal of RHEL-specific packages; otherwise, the distribution is completely similar to RHEL 9.4. The EuroLinux 9 branch will be supported until June 30, 2032. Installation images of 10 GB (appstream) and 2 GB in size have been prepared for download. The project provides scripts for migrating existing installations based on RHEL 7/8/9, AlmaLinux 8/9, CentOS 7/8, Oracle Linux 7/8/9, Rocky Linux 8/9 and CentOS 9 Stream to EuroLinux 9.4.
EuroLinux builds are distributed either through a paid subscription or free of charge. Both options are identical, are built simultaneously, they include a full set of system capabilities and allow you to receive updates. The differences between a free and paid subscription include technical support services, access to errata files, and the ability to use additional packages that include tools for load balancing, high availability, and reliable storage.
https://docs.euro-linux.com/release-notes/9.4/
Release of VCMI 1.5.0: 12/05/2024
The VCMI 1.5 project is now available , developing an open game engine compatible with the data format used in the Heroes of Might and Magic III games. An important goal of the project is also to support mods, to add new cities, heroes, monsters, artifacts and spells to the game. The source code is distributed under the GPLv2 license. It supports Linux, Windows, macOS and Android.
The new version is notable for the significant improvement in online multiplayer support and the addition of a new interface for setting up multiplayer gaming sessions. Add to that, the generation of more realistic-looking random maps, improved performance of the AI engine. They added initial support for game controllers. The ability to customize keyboard shortcuts is also provided.
https://vcmi.eu/blog/2024/05/10/vcmi-150-released/
Release of Pingora 0.2: 12/05/2024
Cloudflare has published the second release of the Pingora framework, designed for developing secure, high-performance network services in Rust. A proxy, built using Pingora, has been used in the Cloudflare content delivery network instead of nginx for about a year and processes more than 40 million requests per second. The code is written in Rust and published under the Apache 2.0 license.
https://github.com/cloudflare/pingora/releases
Linux kernel 6.9 release: 13/05/2024
After two months of development, Linus Torvalds presents the release of the Linux kernel 6.9. Among the most notable changes: the dm-vdo module for deduplication and compression of block devices, direct file access mode in FUSE, support for creating pidfds for individual threads, a BPF token mechanism, support for Rust on ARM64 systems, deprecation of the Ext2 FS driver, removal of the old NTFS driver, support for the Intel FRED mechanism.
The new version includes 15,680 fixes from 2,106 developers, the patch size is 54 MB (the changes affected 11,825 files, 687,954 lines of code were added, 225,344 lines were deleted). The last release had 15641 fixes from 2018 developers, the patch size was 44 MB. About 42% of all changes introduced in 6.9 are related to device drivers, approximately 17% of changes are related to updating code specific to hardware architectures, 13% are related to the network stack, 7% are related to file systems, and 4% are related to internal kernel subsystems.
https://lkml.org/lkml/2024/5/12/224
Viola Workstation K 10.3: 13/05/2024
An update is available for the Linux distribution “Viola Workstation K 10.3”, which offers a KDE desktop environment and is designed for a wide range of users in the office and at home. The distribution can also be part of the Active Directory infrastructure (domain authentication, access to file resources and print resources are available). The build is prepared for x86_64 architecture and built on the ALT 10 platform. There is a live image available.
Only individuals, including individual entrepreneurs, can freely use the downloaded version. Commercial and government organizations can download and test the distribution, but for work in the corporate infrastructure, legal entities must purchase licenses or enter into written licensing agreements.
https://lists.altlinux.org/pipermail/altlinux-announce-ru/2024/000045.html
Debian switches to a stripped-down version of the KeePassXC: 13/05/2024
The maintainer who builds KeePassXC password manager packages for Debian has switched to delivering the most stripped-down version of the program, which retains only the basic functionality necessary for securely storing passwords on the local system. Advanced features, including networking capability, IPC management code, web browser integration components, auto-password functionality, and code to support Yubikey keys, have been removed from the standard keepassxc package to eliminate unnecessary functionality that increases attack surface and has the potential to negatively impact security and privacy.
https://fosstodon.org/@keepassxc/112417353193348720
Rescuezilla 2.5: 13/05/2024
Anew release of the Rescuezilla 2.5 distribution is available, designed for backup, system recovery after failures and diagnosis of various hardware problems. The distribution is built on Ubuntu and continues the development of the “Redo Backup & Rescue” project, where development was discontinued in 2012. Live builds for 64-bit x86 systems (1.2 GB) and a deb package for installation on Ubuntu are offered for download .
Rescuezilla supports backup and recovery of accidentally deleted files on Linux, macOS and Windows partitions. Automatically searches for and connects network partitions that can be used to host backups. The graphical interface is based on the LXDE shell. The format of the created backups is fully compatible with the Clonezilla distribution. Recovery is supported with Clonezilla, Redo Rescue, Foxclone and FSArchiver images, as well as virtual machine images in VirtualBox VDI, VMWare VMDK, QEMU QCOW2, Hyper-V VHDx and .dd/.img formats.
https://github.com/rescuezilla/rescuezilla/releases/tag/2.5
An NVIDIA representative answered questions related to the transfer of drivers to open kernel modules: 14/05/2024
Andy Ritger, who leads NVIDIA's Unix-like operating system driver development, answered questions raised regarding the transition of NVIDIA's proprietary drivers to use open Linux kernel modules by default on systems with GPU-based microarchitectures starting with Turing.
When asked about achieving parity in the functionality of open and proprietary drivers, an NVIDIA representative replied that in driver release 560, open source kernel modules will roughly match the functionality of proprietary modules. Among the limitations, one can use the RTD3 dynamic power management mechanism (Run Time D3) with open kernel modules on older generations of GPUs preceding Ampere (proprietary modules additionally support GPUs on the Turing microarchitecture). The capabilities of open and proprietary modules related to GPU initialization and power management will be quite similar in the NVIDIA 560 drivers, and over time, work will continue to achieve full parity in this direction. Release 560 will also address some long-standing issues in open modules, such as those related to the use of VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) on laptops. NVIDIA has no plans to push for open modules to be included in the main Linux kernel. When asked about support for open Nouveau and NVK drivers , an NVIDIA representative replied that for production applications the company recommends using proprietary drivers and separately supplied open kernel modules. The company has previously made attempts to provide nouveau and nvk developers with documentation for NVIDIA chips and hardware interfaces and provided individual patches, but the assistance provided is modest enough to be called support. When asked about the possibility of support in the open Nouveau driver for proprietary NVIDIA components running in user space, such as CUDA, AI, RT/PT, DLSS and Optix, it was indicated that this is not yet possible and these components cannot work when using the nouveau kernel module. Whether this will be possible in the future is not yet clear. It is noted that with nouveau it is also not yet possible to use features related to configuration and monitoring (nvapi/nvidia-smi). At the same time, a previous license change for nvapi API definitions allowed the wine and proton projects to prepare their own implementations of some nvapi elements used in games. When asked about the participation of NVIDIA employees in the development of nouveau, it is indicated that such participation is still insignificant, but some employees are already contributing to the development of Nouveau and participating in discussions. NVIDIA is not going to provide open kernel modules for older GPUs before the Turing generation. Users of Volta and older GPUs should continue to use the proprietary modules. When asked about the company's plans to open up components of the driver stack for GPUs running in user space, an NVIDIA employee who answered the question said he had not heard of such plans. The decision to use public modules by default is driven by the desire to simplify testing and reduce the overhead of having to retest public and private modules.
Release of Manjaro Linux 24.0: 14/05/2024
A new release of the Manjaro Linux 24.0 distribution, built on Arch Linux and aimed at novice users, is out. The distribution is notable for its simplified and user-friendly installation process, support for automatic hardware detection and installation of the drivers necessary for its operation. Manjaro comes in the form of live builds with the KDE (3.7 GB), GNOME (3.5 GB) and Xfce (3.5 GB) graphical environments built for the x86_64 architecture and various boards based on ARM processors. With the participation of the community, builds with Budgie, Cinnamon, Deepin, LXQt and i3 are further developed .
To manage repositories, Manjaro uses its own BoxIt toolkit, designed similar to Git. The repository is maintained on a rolling basis, but new versions undergo an additional stage of stabilization. In addition to its own repository, there is support for using the AUR (Arch User Repository) repository. The distribution kit is equipped with a graphical installer and a graphical interface for configuring the system.
https://forum.manjaro.org/t/manjaro-24-0-wynsdey-released/161527
ALDOS a variant of Fedora without systemd: 15/05/2024
ALDOS 1.4.18 is presented, offering a classic layout user environment, designed for minimal resource consumption and capable of running on low-power systems. The distribution is based on Fedora Linux technologies, but comes without the systemd system manager, instead they use Upstart to initialize and start services, Eudev is used for devices, and elogind is used to manage sessions. The installation image size is 1.9 GB. The current branch of the ALDOS 1.4 distribution will be supported until the end of September 2029.
Features of ALDOS include: the use of the oldest supported branch of the Linux kernel - 4.19, which is chosen as the least bloated and undemanding of resources, also stands out. Linux kernel 5.4 is available for installation on newer hardware. SELinux is disabled by default. The graphical environment is based on Xfce 4.18, but if desired, you can install MATE, KDE Plasma, LXQt and Lumina Desktop from the repositories. A full set of multimedia codecs is available out of the box, and the repository contains more than 35 thousand packages. By default, localizations are offered for Spanish, Catalan and English (support for other languages can be installed from the repository).
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/1cs8xr7/aldos_fedora_without_systemd/
Release of Endless OS 6.0: 15/05/2024
A new release of Endless OS 6.0 is out, aimed at creating an easy-to-use system in which you can quickly select applications to suit your taste. Applications are distributed as self-contained packages in Flatpak format. Suggested boot images range in size from 1.2 to 23 GB!!
The distribution does not use traditional package managers, instead offering a minimal, atomically updated read-only base system built using the OSTree toolkit (the system image is atomically updated from a Git-like repository). Fedora developers are trying to repeat ideas identical to Endless OS as part of the Silverblue project to create an atomically updated version of Fedora Workstation, as well as the creators of Vanilla OS , CarbonOS , tau-OS and Pop!_OS . The Endless OS installer and update system is used by the GNOME OS project .
Endless OS is one of the distributions that promotes innovation among user Linux systems. The desktop environment in Endless OS is based on a significantly redesigned fork of GNOME. At the same time, Endless developers actively participate in the development of upstream projects. For example, in the GTK+ 3.22 release, about 9.8% of all changes were prepared by Endless developers, and the company overseeing the project, Endless Mobile, is on the oversight board of the GNOME Foundation, along with FSF, Debian, Google, Linux Foundation, Red Hat and SUSE.
https://www.endlessos.org/post/getting-started-with-endless-os-6
Release of Oracle Linux 9.4: 15/05/2024
Oracle has published the release of the Oracle Linux 9.4 distribution, created based on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4 and fully binary compatible with it. Installation iso images of 10 GB and 900 MB in size, prepared for x86_64 and ARM64 (aarch64) architectures, are offered for download. Oracle Linux 9 has unlimited and free access to the yum repository with binary package updates that fix errors (errata) and security issues. Separately supported repositories with sets of Application Stream and CodeReady Builder packages have also been prepared for download.
In addition to the kernel package from RHEL (based on kernel 5.14), Oracle Linux offers its own kernel, Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel 7 Update 2, based on the Linux kernel 5.15 and optimized for working with industrial software and Oracle hardware. The kernel sources, including the breakdown into individual patches, are available in the public Oracle Git repository . The Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel is installed by default, positioned as an alternative to the standard RHEL kernel package and provides a number of advanced features such as DTrace integration and improved Btrfs support. Apart from the additional kernel, the releases of Oracle Linux 9.4 and RHEL 9.4 are completely identical in functionality (the list of changes can be found in the announcement of RHEL 9.4).
https://blogs.oracle.com/linux/post/oracle-linux-9-update-4-is-generally-available
GNOME OS switches to atomic updates using systemd-sysupdate: 15/05/2024
The developers of GNOME OS, an experimental distribution for GNOME developers and testers to evaluate the state of development of the desktop environment, (to get acquainted with emerging new features and test the performance of their applications in GNOME branches in development), announced the transition to the use of the systemd-sysupdate component for organizing atomic updates systems. The purpose of the change is the desire to adapt the nightly builds of GNOME OS to conduct daily quality control of GNOME development.
One of the advantages of switching GNOME OS from OSTree to systemd-sysupdate is the ability to use a verified boot process, in which a chain of trust extends from the bootloader to the system components of the distribution. In addition, using systemd-sysupdate will allow for more complete integration with systemd and enable an architecture that manipulates pre-built system images as indivisible components.
https://www.codethink.co.uk/articles/2024/GNOME-OS-systemd-sysupdate/
An SSH backdoor installed during the kernel.org hack remained undetected for two years: 16/05/2024
Researchers from ESET have published a 43-page report analyzing the Ebury rootkit and related activity. It is claimed that Ebury has been in use since 2009 and has since been installed on more than 400 thousand servers running Linux and several hundred systems based on FreeBSD, OpenBSD and Solaris. Around 110 thousand servers remained affected by Ebury at the end of 2023. The study is of particular interest given that Ebury was involved in the attack on kernel.org, which reveals some new details about the compromise of the Linux kernel development infrastructure identified in 2011. Ebury was also detected on domain registrar servers, crypto exchanges, Tor exit nodes, and several unnamed hosting providers.
Opening of Winamp code announced: 17/05/2024
Llama Group has announced its decision to open source the Winamp media player and move the project to a collaborative development model in which anyone can take part in development. Publication of the code is scheduled for September 24, 2024. According to unofficial information, the transition to an open development model was caused by a reorganization due to financial problems, last year the company was forced to sell the Shoutcast project and fire the core team of developers who maintained the classic Windows application Winamp, in favor of developing the streaming web service of the same name and mobile applications.
The Winamp project was created by Justin Frankel and Dmitry Boldyrev in 1997 and is one of the longest-living multimedia players that continues to actively develop. Winamp is initially designed for use on the Windows platform and has about 83 million users. In April, mobile versions of Winamp were introduced for Android and iOS platforms. Due to its originality and flexibility in the field of changing the interface design through skins, several open clones for Linux were created under the influence of Winamp, such as XMMS , XMMS2 , Beep Media Player, Audacious and Qmmp .
https://about.winamp.com/press/article/winamp-open-source-code
Release of Neovim 0.10: 17/05/2024
Neovim 0.10 has been released, a fork of the Vim editor focused on increasing extensibility and flexibility. The project has been overhauling the Vim code base for over 10 years, resulting in changes that make code easier to maintain, provide a means of dividing labor between multiple maintainers, separate the interface from the core (the interface can be changed without touching the internals), and implement a new extensible architecture based on plugins. The original code of the project is distributed under the Apache 2.0 license, and the basic part is distributed under the Vim license. Ready-made builds are prepared for Linux (appimage), Windows and macOS.
One of the problems with Vim that prompted the creation of Neovim was its bloated, monolithic code base, consisting of more than 300 thousand lines of C (C89) code. Only a few people understand all the nuances of the Vim codebase, and all changes are controlled by one maintainer, which makes it difficult to maintain and improve the editor. Instead of the code built into the Vim core to support the GUI, Neovim proposes using a universal layer that allows you to create interfaces using various toolkits.
https://gpanders.com/blog/whats-new-in-neovim-0.10/
Release 7-Zip 24.05: 18/05/2024
Igor Pavlov announced a major version of the 7-Zip archiver 24.05. The project code is written in C++ and is distributed under the LGPL license. Ready-made builds for Windows and Linux are available for download for i686, x86-64 and ARM 32/64 architectures. Unfortunately, most distributions still ship with outdated p7zip, which is more than 7 years old. Probably because the 7z code depends on the ASMC project, which is not used anywhere else.
https://sourceforge.net/p/sevenzip/discussion/45797/thread/b92679e642/
Changes to improve the display of KDE applications in GNOME and Xfce: 18/05/2024
Nate Graham, QA developer for the KDE project, has published another report on KDE development. The most notable change is an initiative to address icon issues when running KDE Gear-included applications in non-KDE environments such as GNOME and Xfce. The problem is that when creating the interface of KDE applications, icons from the general Breeze theme are used. When running in KDE, the state of the icon theme and applications are synchronized, but in third-party environments the Breeze theme may be missing or diverge from the reference version, resulting in dialogs and widgets showing empty spaces, placeholders, or icons that are not what the application authors intended.
As a solution to this problem, for KDE applications intended for use outside the KDE Plasma environment, functionality has been prepared for embedding the Breeze reference style and icons, which will be enabled by default, but can be overridden by the system or user. Projects like Kate, Konsole and Dolphin are already planning to use this new feature. It is noteworthy that the discussion of a symmetric solution to problems encountered when running GNOME applications in KDE is being carried out by the GNOME developers.
https://pointieststick.com/2024/05/17/this-week-in-kde-all-about-those-apps
The openSUSE project has published the Agama 8 installer, freed from binding to Cockpit: 18/05/2024
The developers of the openSUSE project have published the release of the Agama 8 installer (formerly D-Installer), which is being developed to replace the classic SUSE and openSUSE installation interface, and is notable for separating the user interface from the YaST internals. Agama provides the ability to use various frontends, for example, a frontend for managing the installation via a web interface. To test the new installer, live builds have been created for the x86_64, ppc64le, s390x and ARM64 architectures, supporting the installation of openSUSE Leap, the continuously updated openSUSE Tumbleweed build, as well as several editions of SUSE ALP based on isolated containers.
The new installer provides the capabilities necessary to solve tasks, such as choosing an initial set of applications, setting up a network connection, language, keyboard, time zone and localization settings, preparing a storage device and partitioning, and adding users to the system. The main goals of Agama's development include; eliminating existing limitations of the graphical interface, expanding the ability to use YaST functionality in other applications, moving away from being tied to a single programming language, and encouraging the creation of alternative settings by members of the community.
https://yast.opensuse.org/blog/2024-05-17/agama-8
Release of MX Linux 23.3: 20/05/2024
A new release of the lightweight distribution MX Linux 23.3 has been published, created by the joint communities formed around the antiX and MEPIS projects. The release is based on Debian with improvements from the antiX project and packages from its own repository. The distribution uses the sysVinit initialization system and its own tools for configuring and deploying the system. There are 32- and 64-bit builds ( x86_64 , i386 ) with the Xfce desktop (2.1 GB), as well as 64-bit builds with the KDE desktop (2.6 GB) and builds (1.7 GB) with the Fluxbox window manager available for download.
https://mxlinux.org/blog/mx-23-3-libretto-released/
Ubuntu 24.04 builds for the Nintendo Switch: 20/05/2024
The Switchroot project has announced that a build of Ubuntu 24.04 is ready for download on Nintendo Switch game consoles based on the Tegra X1 SoC (Switch 2017, Switch 2019, Switch Lite and Switch OLED). In addition to Ubuntu, the Switchroot project also provides builds of Fedora 39, Lakka 5.0 and LineageOS 18.1 for download on the Nintendo Switch. Booting is done from an SD card using the hekate bootloader ( RCM is used to bypass the blocking ). Additional components developed by the project are distributed under the Apache 2.0 license.
Currently only KDE Plasma and Unity are supported (builds with GNOME are delayed due to problems with touch screens and full-screen output performance when using X11 on ARM64 systems.
Supported features include pairing with Nintendo Switch Pro, GameCube, Dualshock 4, X-Box One and Joy-Con controllers, overclocking the CPU, GPU and memory, support for USB-C, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, DisplayPort/HDMI, light sensor , sound, Touchscreen, eMMC/SD, drivers for Tegra GPU with support for Vulkan, OpenGL, OpenGLES, EGL and CUDA, hardware acceleration of video decoding (in SMPV Player, ffmpeg, mpv and chromium-browser), deep sleep mode. NFC and infrared (IR) are not supported.
https://twitter.com/switchroot_org/status/1785702619509346306
IceWM 3.5.0 released: 20/05/2024
The lightweight window manager IceWM 3.5.0 is out. IceWM provides full control through keyboard shortcuts, the ability to use virtual desktops, the taskbar and application menus and you can use tabs to group windows. The window manager is configured through a fairly simple configuration file and themes can be used. One can combine windows in the form of tabs. Built-in applets are available for monitoring CPU, memory, and traffic. The code is written in C++ and distributed under the GPLv2 license.
https://github.com/ice-wm/icewm/releases/tag/3.5.0
Release of free 2D CAD software CadZinho 0.6: 21/05/2024
The minimalistic CAD program, CadZinho 0.6.0 has been released, providing tools for creating simple 2D technical drawings. The new version implements a new rendering architecture, which makes it possible to get rid of interface freezes during operation. The code is written in C with additions in Lua and is distributed under the MIT license. The output is generated using the SDL 2.0 library and the OpenGL 3.2 API. Builds are prepared for Linux, Windows and macOS.
The program supports drawing primitives such as lines, polygonal meshes, circles, arcs, ellipses, text, hatching, splines, images, points, labels, attributes and polylines. Layers and blocks are supported, as well as working with files in DXF and SVG formats. The result can be exported to G-code, HPGL, PDF, SVG, PS or image formats. A scripting language is provided for developing macros, extensions and customizing the interface. The ZeroBrane Studio development environment (Lua IDE) can be used, to develop extensions.
https://github.com/zecruel/CadZinho/releases/tag/0.6.0
Release of Geary 46.0: 21/05/2024
The Geary 46.0 email client, slated for use in GNOME, has been published. The project was originally founded by the Yorba Foundation, which created the popular photo manager Shotwell, but later development was taken over by the GNOME community. The code is written in Vala and is licensed under the LGPL. Builds will soon be prepared in the form of a flatpak package.
The goal of the project development is to create a product rich in capabilities, but at the same time extremely easy to use and consuming a minimum of resources. The email client is designed both for stand-alone use and to work in conjunction with web-based email services such as Gmail and Yahoo! Mail. The interface is implemented using the GTK3+ library. An SQLite database is used to store the message database, and a full-text index is created to search the message database. To work with IMAP, a GObject-based library is used that works in asynchronous mode.
The new version simplifies notification messages, solves problems with navigation, ensures that messages continue to be delivered after errors during data transfer, adjusts the correct counting of unread messages, updates translations, and makes minor improvements to the interface.
https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/geary/-/tags/46.0
GhostBSD 24.04.1: 21/05/2024
A new release of the desktop-oriented distribution GhostBSD 24.04.1, built on FreeBSD 14-STABLE and offering the MATE user environment, has been published. The community creates unofficial builds with Xfce. By default, GhostBSD uses the ZFS file system. Both work in Live mode and installation on a hard drive are supported (using its own ginstall installer, written in Python). Boot images are created for x86_64 architecture (2.6 GB).
https://www.ghostbsd.org/news/GhostBSD_24.04.1_Is_Now_Available
Release of Alpine Linux 3.20: 22/05/2024
The release of Alpine Linux 3.20 is available, a minimalistic distribution built on the Musl system library and a set of BusyBox utilities. The distribution has increased security requirements and is built with SSP (Stack Smashing Protection). OpenRC is used as the initialization system, and its own apk package manager is used to manage packages. Alpine is used to build official Docker container images and is used in the PostmarketOS project. Bootable iso images (x86_64, x86, armhf, aarch64, armv7, ppc64le, s390x) are prepared in six versions: standard (209 MB), network bootable (229 MB), extended (975 MB), for virtual machines (61 MB ) and for the Xen hypervisor (956 MB).
https://alpinelinux.org/posts/Alpine-3.20.0-released.html
Qualcomm will provide support for Snapdragon X Elite chips in the Linux kernel: 23/05/2024
Qualcomm has announced that it is working to bring changes to the main Linux kernel to support the ARM SoC Snapdragon X Elite, which uses its own 12-core Qualcomm Oryon CPU and Qualcomm Adreno GPU. The chip is aimed at use in laptops and PCs, and is ahead of the Apple M3 and Intel Core Ultra 155H chips in many performance tests. The first devices based on Snapdragon X Elite are expected in the middle of the year and will come with Windows, bleh. The changes published by Qualcomm provide the ability to use Linux on these devices.
In addition to patches for the Linux kernel, together with Lenovo, Arm and Linaro, they are developing the DtbLoader driver for UEFI firmware based on the TianoCore EDK2 open platform, a Grub-based bootloader and scripts for creating your own Debian builds for some devices based on the Snapdragon X Elite SoC, as well as already produced SoCs. Among the already released laptops that support Linux booting are the Lenovo Yoga C630 (Snapdragon 850), Lenovo Flex 5G (Snapdragon 8cx Gen 1) and Lenovo ThinkPad X13s (Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3). The bootloader supports dual booting of Windows and Linux.
Plans for the next six months include adding support for hardware acceleration of video decoding to Firefox and Chrome, implementing camera support based on the libcamera-SoftISP stack, optimizing GPU and CPU performance, and optimizing tools for managing energy consumption. Also mentioned is the inclusion of firmware for the new SoC in the Linux firmware set and support for the use of Ubuntu and Debian installers on devices with Snapdragon X Elite.
Release of KDE Gear 24.05: 23/05/2024
The May rollout update for KDE Gear 24.05 applications developed by the KDE project has been announced. This is the second major update to the suite of applications published as part of the KDE 6 branch and after the transition to using the Qt 6 library. The suite contains releases of 250 programs, libraries and plugins. Information about the availability of Live builds with new application releases can be found on the page linked below. New versions of individual applications can be downloaded from the Flathub and SnapCraft directories .
https://kde.org/announcements/gear/24.05.0/
GCompris 4.1 update: 24/05/2024
GCompris 4.1, a free learning center for preschool and primary school children, is out. The package provides 190 mini-lessons and modules, offering from a simple graphics editor, puzzles and keyboard simulator to lessons in mathematics, geography and reading training. GCompris uses the Qt library and is developed by the KDE community. Ready-made builds are created for Linux , macOS , Windows , Raspberry Pi and Android. In the new version, work has been done to improve the graphics in various lessons.
https://gcompris.net/news/2024-05-23-en.html
SANE 1.3 published with support for new scanner models: 24/05/2024
A new release of the sane-backends 1.3.1 package has been published, which includes a set of drivers, the scanimage command line utility, the saned background process for organizing network scanning, and libraries with the SANE-API implementation. The project code is distributed under the GPLv2 license. The 1.3.0 release was missed due to problems in the build infrastructure.
The package supports 1804 (in the previous version 1747) scanner models, of which 825 (815) have full support for all functions, for 825 (780) the level of support is rated as good, for 130 (129) - acceptable, and for 24 (23) - minimal. Additionally, for 499 (464) devices there is an incompletely tested driver implementation. Support for 478 (470) scanners remains unrealized.
https://alioth-lists.debian.net/pipermail/sane-announce/2024/000047.html
Initial prototype of the new installer for GNOME OS: 25/05/2024
With the transition of the GNOME OS distribution to use the systemd-sysupdate component to organize atomic system updates, the development of a new installer for GNOME OS began. The development is still at the initial prototype stage, which is based on the interface layouts published in April, prepared by the designers of the GNOME project. At the current stage of development, the main focus is still on the general architecture and determining the internal logic, for example, organizing navigation and setting the order of page display in preparation for installation. The installer code is developed in Rust and distributed under the GPLv3 license.
GNOME OS is an experimental distribution for GNOME developers and testers to evaluate the state of desktop environment development, explore new features as they emerge, and test their applications running on development branches of GNOME.
https://thisweek.gnome.org/posts/2024/05/twig-149/
Release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.10: 25/05/2024
Following the release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4, an update to the previous branch of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.10 was published, which is supported in parallel with the RHEL 9.x branch and will be supported at least until 2029. Installation builds are prepared for x86_64, s390x (IBM System z), ppc64le and Aarch64 architectures, but are available for download only to registered Red Hat Customer Portal users ( CentOS Stream 9 iso images and free RHEL builds for developers can also be used).
RHEL 8.10 was the last release in the 8.x branch, formed at the full support stage, implying the inclusion of functional improvements. On May 31, 2024, the 8.x branch will be moved to the maintenance stage, where priorities will shift towards bug fixes and security, with minor improvements related to support for critical hardware systems.
https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/optimize-application-life-cycles-red-hat-enterprise-linux-810
The ravynOS project is developing an edition of FreeBSD aimed at compatibility with macOS: 27/05/2024
After two years of development, the ravynOS 0.5 project has been released, developing a FreeBSD-based operating system aimed at achieving compatibility with macOS applications and providing a macOS-style user shell. The project's code is distributed under the BSD license. The size of the boot iso image is 869 MB (x86_64).
The stated goals of the project are to achieve compatibility with macOS applications at the level of source code and executable files. In the first case, it is possible to recompile the code of macOS applications for execution in ravynOS, in the second - embedding changes into the kernel and toolkit to run Mach-O executable files compiled for x86-64 and arm64 architectures. Each home directory has a ~/Library subdirectory for applications that use Apple's Cocoa programming interface.
For compatibility with macOS, a partial implementation of the Cocoa and Objective-C runtime programming interface is provided (located in the /System/Library/Frameworks directory), as well as compilers and linkers modified to support them. In addition to the macOS compatibility layer, ravynOS also offers the ability to run Linux applications, based on FreeBSD's Linux emulation infrastructure (Linuxulator).
The graphical environment is built on its own window server, using a stripped-down composite labwc server (support for server-side window decoration and themes has been removed), wlroots and the Wayland protocol. Graphical applications can use the Qt and Cocoa frameworks. The interface uses typical macOS concepts, such as a top bar with a global menu, an identical menu structure, keyboard shortcuts, a similar-style Filer file manager, and support for commands such as launchctl and open.