Linux NewsLinux Mint Debuts Xepub As New EPUB Reader, Clockenstein Calendar App
The Linux Mint project today published their August 2026 development report, including some new applications added to their XApp collection...
Patches Ready For AMDGPU HDMI 2.1 Enabled By Default With Linux 7.4 With FreeSync, VRR & ALLM
Linux 7.4 is now set to reach the elusive milestone of HDMI 2.1 support for the AMDGPU kernel graphics driver. After the HDMI Forum previously rejected HDMI 2.1 for the AMDGPU open-source driver implementation going back years, earlier this year something changed -- widely speculated to be with Valve's involvement -- that HDMI 2.1 patches began appearing for the AMDGPU driver. With the upcoming Linux 7.4 cycle, the bulk of that work will now be in place and enabled by default...
Git 2.56-rc0 Released With Updated Contribution Guidelines, Improvements For Swift
While still ultimately working toward Git 3.0 with SHA-256 hashes by default and the "main" branch name by default, among other breaking changes (and potentially coming around the end of 2026), Git 2.56-rc0 is now available for testing...
Intel Thermald 2.5.13 Restores Accidentally Deleted Wildcat Lake Support
Intel's Thermald released on Thursday as the newest update to this daemon for thermal monitoring on Intel hardware that was also recently extended for beginning to support Qualcomm/ARM hardware too. The main change with Thermald 2.5.13 is adding back Intel Wildcat Lake platform support after it was accidentally removed in the prior release...
GCC 13.5 Released With 265+ Bug Fixes
For those continuing to rely on the GCC 13 compiler in production that debuted more than three years ago, GCC 13.5 released today with more than 265 bug fixes. GCC 13.5 also caps off the GCC 13 series as the last planned point release...
BeOS-Inspired Haiku Now Supports Changing Audio Outputs Live, Other Improvements
In addition to August bringing the long-awaited Haiku R1 Beta 6 release, there was also a lot of development progress on this BeOS-inspired operating system too during the course of the past month...
GIMP 3.2.6 Released With Some Early Preparations Toward Eventual GTK4 Port
The long-awaited GIMP 3.0 release for transitioning from GTK2 to GTK3 only saw its stable release last year. But with GTK4 already being out for years, GIMP developers have begun making some very early preparations toward an inevitable GTK4 port...
Mesa 26.3 RADV + RadeonSI Ready With DRM Format Modifiers For Older AMD GPUs
Coming with Linux 7.3 is DRM format modifiers for GFX6 through GFX8 era GPUs covering the original Raddeon HD 7000 (GCN 1.0) graphics cards up through the Polaris and Fiji series. This work by Valve's Timur Kristóf is necessary for these older GPUs to support Vulkan-based Wayland compositors, better interoperability between OpenGL and Vulkan or other APis, compositors running on the Zink OpenGL-on-Vulkan driver implementation, and other benefits. Now merged for Mesa 26.3 is the RadeonSI and RADV user-space side support for making use of the format modifiers on these older GPUs...
Ubuntu 24.04.5 LTS Released With Linux 7.0 HWE Stack
For those continuing to make use of the Ubuntu 24.04 Long Term Support "LTS" series, Ubuntu 24.04.5 LTS is out today as the newest point release...
Intel Xeon 600 Workstation Performance vs. AMD Threadripper 9000 In Nearly 400 Benchmarks
Last month I had the chance to test the Xeon 678X workstation processor as my first hands-on opportunity with the Xeon 600 "Granite Rapids WS" series. The Intel Xeon 678X was within the HP Z4 G6i workstation and used it for a number of different benchmarks. In that HP workstation review were also some comparison points to the likes of AMD Ryzen Threadripper while in this article are some much more concentrated benchmarks between the competing Xeon 600 series and AMD Ryzen Threadripper 9000 series for workstations. Nearly 400 benchmarks plus power and frequency comparison too.
KDE Plasma 6.8 Beta Released With Many Great Improvements, Kup Backup Scheduler
Ahead of the stable release of Plasma 6.8 due out on 14 October that also marks the 30th anniversary of the KDE project, out today is the much anticipated beta release...
Intel BFF Driver Slated For Linux 7.4 Introduction
Last month I covered Intel posting a new driver named "BFF" for the Linux kernel. This BFF driver is for a new hardware feature debuting with next-gen Diamond Rapids processors for better dealing with aging CPU silicon where some bits may become stuck over time...
NVIDIA NVK Driver Lands Improvement To Help With Valve's Gamescope
Merged today for next quarter's Mesa 26.3 release is an improvement for the open-source NVIDIA "NVK" Vulkan driver paired with the Nouveau kernel driver. This latest NVK improvement benefits usage of Valve's Gamescope micro-compositor and should help with performance during game recording and remote play...
X.Org Server 26.1 Moves Closer To Release As Half-Decade Update
We're getting closer to the X.Org Server 26.1 stable release as the first new tagged feature release since X.Org Server 21.1 debuted back in October 2021. There have been some new features, many code reverts, and many bug fixes merged over the past five years that will culminate with the X.Org Server 26.1 stable release...
GNOME 51 Adds Support For Custom Pointer Acceleration Profiles
As a last minute change ahead of next week's GNOME 51 desktop release, changes to Mutter and gsettings-desktop-schemas have now landed for supporting custom pointer acceleration profiles...