Linux Mint is working on a redesigned screensaver and lock screen for the Cinnamon desktop. Based on our first look, itâs a solid improvement. If the word âscreensaverâ conjures flying star fields or photo slideshows, thatâs fair, but in Cinnamon it also acts as the âscreen lockerâ. In 2026, âsavingâ the screen is less of a concern than âlockingâ it, but many users enjoy seeing a pretty âidleâ display. Cinnamonâs new lock screen will, based on designs shared by Linux Mint, convey more information without you needing to unlock. Battery level, time and date, media player controls and unread notifications [âŚ]
If you take handwritten notes on a Linux tablet, chances are that Xournal++ is already on your radar as its solid stylus support and touchscreen compatibility has earned it a loyal following among those whoâd rather annotate PDFs or sketch diagrams than type everything out. One criticism that follows it around is its interface. Itâs rather pointer-led; lots of menus, buttons and tiny hit targets in toolbars. It doesnât prevent you from doing what you opened the app to do â write, draw, scrawl and markup â but itâs not ideal. Well, thatâs what a new tablet mode toolbar configuration [âŚ]
Did I get old or has the humble image meme atrophied under the glut of AI slop? Donât sugar coat it; itâs the former, as a new Linux app called Memerist hit Flathub recently to make it easier to customise and generate meme templates. Memerist is a native (GTK4/libadwaita) app for Linux desktop. It is technically an image editor with a focused set of features, geared to those who want a convenient, local tool to quickly create and share popular memes. While the primary use case is for making memes, Memerist will open any image file. You can use it [âŚ]
GIMP 3.2 RC3 is now available for testing, giving those interested in trying the image editorâs upcoming features, the chance to do so. This is the third (and likely final) release candidate before the stable GIMP 3.2 release arrives. Itâs said to deliver âa number of bug fixes and final polishesâ to the many new features added in the development and beta builds. The changes mentioned below are from between RC2 to RC3, not from GIMP 3.0 to GIMP 3.2. If youâve not tracked development, donât think that what follows is an overview of whatâs new in GIMP 3.2 as [âŚ]
February 2026 delivered a fresh batch of Linux app releases, with updates to VLC, GIMP, Vivaldi, and VirtualBox among the many that filtered out. I covered some of the monthâs biggest releases with fully-featured articles, like Firefox 148 with AI âkill switchâ, a more capable ONLYOFFICE 9.3 productivity suite and Typhoonâs Qt 6 port. They werenât the only ones of note. Below, I roundup a fleet of Februaryâs other software releases. Some updates were more of the modest maintenance variety, while others were more substantial new features. Ardour 9.2 finally arrived Ardour, the open-source digital audio workstation (DAW), saw its [âŚ]
A new version of ONLYFFICE Desktop Editors, a open source office suite for Windows, macOS and Linux, is out with a fresh set of features and tools. ONLYOFFICE 9.3 adds more signature options for PDF forms, multipage view for documents, new solver tools and regex formulas in the spreadsheets and support for animated GIFs in presentation slides made with the suiteâs PowerPoint equivalent. But thereâs a less-obvious change lurking within that may have a more appreciable impact on day-to-day document editing. For a closer look at the changes this update brings, read on. ONLYOFFICE 9.3: Highlights ONLYOFFICE Desktop Editors provide [âŚ]
Canonicalâs engineers have announced the fourth and final monthly snapshot of Ubuntu 26.04, ahead of next monthâs all important beta release. Ubuntu 26.04 Snapshot 4, like all other monthly snapshots, not a blessed build intended for mainstream usage. Itâs a âthrowaway artifactâ that enables the distroâs engineers to fine-tune and hone a new automated build system. Compared to the January release of snapshot 3, thereâs more âof noteâ packed inside of this one, like the Linux 6.19 kernel and more GNOME 50 beta components (Mutter, Files, etc). In announcing the release of Snpshot 4, Canonicalâs Utkarsh Gupta also notes Ubuntu [âŚ]
Name: Password feedback in sudo. Age: New, but itâs absence is over 40 years old. Appearance: ********. Whatâs changed? When you run a command in Ubuntu 26.04 LTS with sudo and you are asked to enter your password, youâll now see asterisks appear as you type. Previously: nothing. A blinking cursor, the void, a creeping fear that your keyboard had stopped working, etc. Iâve always wondered why it didnât do that⌠You and a lot of other people. Linux Mint enables password feedback by default since, yâknow, some feedback is better than none. Not showing feedback is a behaviour that stretches back to the original [âŚ]
Ubuntu has unveiled the default wallpaper that will grace millions of screen in the upcoming 26.06 LTS âResolute Raccoonâ release. As is tradition, the new desktop background features mascot artwork in the middle of a rich purple gradient. I shared the official mascot art with you a couple of week ago. It looked great in isolation but here, sit against the gradient backdrop, it looks even better. However, the new design does deviate heavily from the past five wallpapers as curved shapes frame the mascot instead of sharp, diagonal geometric planes. Those angular folds created more of a folded paper [âŚ]
The forecast is looking Qt for fans of open-source weather app Typhoon, the latest update to which swaps its GTK3 backend for a more modern Qt 6. Most interesting about the change is that it doesnât have any impact on the UI. Typhoon still shows a colourful, borderless window with transparency, and conveys weather forecast data using stark white text and glyphs. Archisman Panigrahi, Typhoonâs developer, says the Qt port means the app is no longer using the deprecated GTK3 toolkit, but that moving to GTK4 was a non-starter as it âdoes not play well with simultaneously borderless and draggable [âŚ]
Those testing Ubuntu 26.04 daily builds or monthly snapshots may have noticed that Showtime, GNOMEâs spiffy new video player, is not preinstalled in the âextended selectionâ, despite being announced as a replacement for Totem. Itâs especially confusing since Resources system monitor, announced as a software swap the same time as Showtime, has been on the ISO for a while. Credits need not roll on hope yet, as Showtime could be making its debut soon. Its latest package upload to the resolute archives includes a change that goes some way to explaining why itâs not been present sooner. It reads: âDepend [âŚ]
Dynamic Music Pill is a GNOME Shell extension that embeds a pill-shaped media controller into your desktop panel. It shows album art, artist name and track title alongside an animated waveform visualiser. Unashamedly blingy, but thereâs nothing wrong in that. The extension received an update today, which seem a good hook to actually take this off my âto write aboutâ list. V20 adds a compact mode to hide all text; player filtering to add/ignore specific apps; and the option to set fallback album art for players/streams that donât emit any. Dynamic Music Pill works with any MPRIS-compatible media player. That [âŚ]
The new Firefox 148 update begins rolling out today with a long-awaited âAI kill switchâ, letting you finally nix nags to try big-tech chatbots or generate error-prone link summaries. If you turn off AI features in Firefox using the new toggle, Mozilla says future updates wonât undo or second guess your decision as new AI features arrive are added to the browser. Given that Mozilla now measures success by how much revenue it makes from AI features in its products, Firefox included, that stance is a reassuring one. To disable AI features in Firefox go to Settings > AI Controls. [âŚ]
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS âResolute Raccoonâ will use OpenJDK 25 as its default Java version. An expected change as OpenJDK 25 is a long-term support release, as Ubuntu 26.04 is, the bump brings various feature and performance improvements to developers over OpenJDK 21, the default version used in Ubuntu 24.04 LTS through 25.10. On Ubuntu, Java isnât installed out of the box, but when you install default-jdk or default-jre (directly or indirectly as a dependency needed by other software) those meta-packages point to whichever OpenJDK version Canonical has blessed as current. In Ubuntu 26.04 LTS, that will be OpenJDK 25. Version 25 of OpenJDK, the [âŚ]
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