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Last Notes

2026-07-08 22:28:16 UTC

You paid me, a long-time Linux user, to use Windows 11 exclusively for a month: here’s how it went
You all donated en masse to have me use Windows 11 for a month, and so I did. What was it like for a long-time Linux user to go back and experience Windows as it exists now? Is it really as bad as we've collectively made it out to be? Did my m
https://www.osnews.com/story/145459/you-paid-me-a-long-time-linux-user-to-use-windows-11-exclusively-for-a-month-heres-how-it-went/
#Windows

2026-06-15 14:01:16 UTC

“Your EPUB is fine. Kobo disagrees. Blame Adobe.”
An infuriating story about something most of us don't really stop to think about: e-books and the rendering engines companies and software use to display them.
It’s the year 2026. Thanks to the horrendous [Adobe] RMSDK which Kobo decided to use as their backbone for all book rendering (probably for DRM reasons), a single li
https://www.osnews.com/story/145302/your-epub-is-fine-kobo-disagrees-blame-adobe/
#GeneralDevelopment

2026-05-24 15:05:31 UTC

Flatpak will depend on systemd
If you visit the Flatpak website today, it lists, as the very first advantage of the project: "Build for every distro: create one app and distribute it to the entire Linux desktop market." If you then move on to the list of supported distributions, you'll see the usual suspects, but also distributions like Void Linux, Guix, and Alpine. These last three all have one thing in co
https://www.osnews.com/story/145071/flatpak-will-depend-on-systemd/
#Linux

2026-05-03 20:15:12 UTC

GNOME is good, actually
While I'm normally a KDE user, I do keep close tabs on various other desktop environments, and install and set them up every now and then to see how they're fairing, what improvements they've made, and ultimately, if my preference for KDE is still warranted. This usually means setting up a nice OpenBSD installation for Xfce, Fedora for GNOME, and less often others for some of the more niche
https://www.osnews.com/story/144862/gnome-is-good-actually/
#Gnome

2026-04-08 21:10:33 UTC

Mac OS X 10.0 Cheetah ported to Nintendo Wii
Since its launch in 2007, the Wii has seen several operating systems ported to it: Linux, NetBSD, and most-recently, Windows NT. Today, Mac OS X joins that list.
In this post, I’ll share how I ported the first version of Mac OS X, 10.0 Cheetah, to the Nintendo Wii. If you’re not an operating systems expert or low-level engineer, you’re in good co
https://www.osnews.com/story/144756/mac-os-x-10-0-cheetah-ported-to-nintendo-wii/
#macOS

2026-04-07 14:01:54 UTC

Plan 9 is a uniquely complete operating system
From 2024, but still accurate and interesting:
Plan 9 is unique in this sense that everything the system needs is covered by the base install. This includes the compilers, graphical environment, window manager, text editors, ssh client, torrent client, web server, and the list goes on. Nearly everything a user can do with the system is avai
https://www.osnews.com/story/144752/plan-9-is-a-uniquely-complete-operating-system/
#OSNews

2026-04-07 13:33:24 UTC

Anos: a hobby microkernel operating system written in C
Anos is a modern, opinionated, non-POSIX operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like GNU-Linux) for x86_64 PCs and RISC-V machines.
Anos currently comprises the STAGE3 microkernel, SYSTEM user-mode supervisor, and a base set of servers implementing the base of the operating system. There is a (WIP) too
https://www.osnews.com/story/144750/anos-a-hobby-microkernel-operating-system-written-in-c/
#OSNews

2026-04-07 13:16:24 UTC

The 499th patch for 2.11BSD released
This year sees 35 years since 2.11BSD was announced on March 14, 1991 - itself a slightly late celebration of 20 years of the PDP-11 - and January 2026 brought what looks to be the venerable 16-bit OS's biggest ever patch!
Much of the 1.3 MB size is due to Anders Magnusson, well-known for his work on NetBSD and the Portable C Compiler. Since 2.11BSD's stdio
https://www.osnews.com/story/144748/the-499th-patch-for-2-11bsd-released/
#BSDDarwin

2026-04-06 23:32:03 UTC

KDE is bringing back its classic Oxygen and Air themes
Anyone remember the KDE 4.0 themes Oxygen and Air? Well, several KDE developers have been working tirelessly to bring them back, which means they're patching it up, fixing bugs, and generally making these classic themes work well in the current releases of KDE Plasma 6.
The last post regarding work on fixing Oxygen was a month
https://www.osnews.com/story/144745/kde-is-bringing-back-its-classic-oxygen-and-air-themes/
#KDE

2026-04-06 19:48:13 UTC

“I used AI. It worked. I hated it.”
This is a great post, but obviously it hasn't convinced me:
The folks waving their arms and yelling about recent models' capabilities have a point: the thing works. This project finished in three weeks. Compare that to Ringspace, a similarly-sized project that took me about six months of nights and early mornings to complete, while not doing my day jo
https://www.osnews.com/story/144743/i-used-ai-it-worked-i-hated-it/
#GeneralDevelopment

2026-04-05 13:59:08 UTC

Adobe secretly modifies your hosts file for the stupidest reason
If you're using Windows or macOS and have Adobe Creative Cloud installed, you may want to take a peek at your hosts file. It turns out Adobe adds a bunch of entries into the hosts file, for a very stupid reason.
I found that in my hosts file the other day too, and I investigated to find why they're doing
https://www.osnews.com/story/144737/adobe-secretly-modifies-your-hosts-file-for-the-stupidest-reason/
#ClownCar

2026-04-04 07:32:46 UTC

TinyOS: ultra-lightweight RTOS for IoT devices
An ultra-lightweight real-time operating system for resource-constrained IoT and embedded devices. Kernel footprint under 10 KB, 2 KB minimum RAM, preemptive priority-based scheduling.
↫ TinyOS GitHub page
Written in C, open source, and supports ARM and RISC-V.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144735/tinyos-ultra-lightweight-rtos-for-iot-devices/
#OSNews

2026-04-04 07:28:48 UTC

Redox gets new CPU scheduler
Another major improvement in Redox: a brand new scheduler which improves performance under load considerably.
We have replaced the legacy Round Robin scheduler with a Deficit Weighted Round Robin scheduler. Due to this, we finally have a way of assigning different priorities to our Process contexts. When running under light load, you may not notice any difference, but under
https://www.osnews.com/story/144733/redox-gets-new-cpu-scheduler/
#RedoxOS

2026-04-04 07:21:49 UTC

Open source office suites erupt in forking and licensing drama
You'd think if there was one corner of the open source world where you wouldn't find drama it'd be open source office suites, but it turns out we could not have been more wrong. First, there's The Document Foundation, stewards of LibreOffice, ejecting a ton of LibreOffice contributors.
In the ongoing saga of
https://www.osnews.com/story/144731/open-source-office-suites-erupt-in-forking-and-licensing-drama/
#Office

2026-04-04 06:42:47 UTC

How Microsoft vaporized a trillion dollars
This is the first of a series of articles in which you will learn about what may be one of the silliest, most preventable, and most costly mishaps of the 21st century, where Microsoft all but lost OpenAI, its largest customer, and the trust of the US government.
↫ Axel Rietschin
It won't take long into this series of articles before you start won
https://www.osnews.com/story/144729/how-microsoft-vaporized-a-trillion-dollars/
#Microsoft

2026-04-03 20:06:05 UTC

Big-endian testing with QEMU
I assume I don't have to explain the difference between big-endian and little-endian systems to the average OSNews reader, and while most systems are either dual-endian or (most likely) little-endian, it's still good practice to make sure your code works on both. If you don't have a big-endian system, though, how do you do that?
When programming, it is still impor
https://www.osnews.com/story/144727/big-endian-testing-with-qemu/
#GeneralDevelopment

2026-04-01 19:43:22 UTC

How to turn anything into a router
I don’t like to cover “current events” very much, but the American government just revealed a truly bewildering policy effectively banning import of new consumer router models. This is ridiculous for many reasons, but if this does indeed come to pass it may be beneficial to learn how to “homebrew” a router.
Fortunately, you can make a router out of basically anyt
https://www.osnews.com/story/144706/how-to-turn-anything-into-a-router/
#Internet

2026-03-31 14:45:45 UTC

Trans rights are very obviously human rights. As long as fascists, nazis, and other extremists keep denying these rights, Transgender Day of Visibility really should be a riot.
I published this permanent page on OSNews a year or so ago, and sadly, it bears repeating as things have only gotten worse:
https://www.osnews.com/trans-rights-are-human-rights/

2026-03-30 21:14:43 UTC

Microsoft Copilot is now injecting ads into pull requests on GitHub
Why do so many people keep falling for the same trick over and over again?
With an over $400 billion gap between the money invested in AI data centers and the actual revenue these products generate, Silicon Valley slowly returned to the tested and trusted playbook: advertising.
Now, ads are sta
https://www.osnews.com/story/144703/microsoft-copilot-is-now-injecting-ads-into-pull-requests-on-github/
#ClownCar

2026-03-30 21:02:29 UTC

Capability-based security for Redox: namespace and CWD as capabilities
By reimplementing these features using capabilities, we made the kernel simpler by moving complex scheme and namespace management out of it which improved security and stability by reducing the attack surface and possible bugs. At the same time, we gained a means to support more sandboxing feature
https://www.osnews.com/story/144701/capability-based-security-for-redox-namespace-and-cwd-as-capabilities/
#RedoxOS

2026-03-30 20:35:40 UTC

The curious case of retro demo scene graphics
Of course, it was only a matter of time before the time-honoured tradition of the demoscene also got infected by "AI".
For me personally, generative AI ruins much of the fun. I still enjoy creating pixel art and making little animations and demos. My own creative process remains satisfying as an isolated activity. Alas, obvious AI generated
https://www.osnews.com/story/144699/the-curious-case-of-retro-demo-scene-graphics/
#Graphics

2026-03-27 19:40:26 UTC

Running a Plan 9 network on OpenBSD
This guide describes how you can install a Plan 9 network on an OpenBSD machine (it will probably work on any unix machine though). The authentication service (called "authsrv" on Plan 9) is provided by a unix version: authsrv9. The file service is provided by a program called "u9fs". It comes with Plan 9. Both run from inetd. The (diskless) cpu server is provided
https://www.osnews.com/story/144695/running-a-plan-9-network-on-openbsd/
#OpenBSD

2026-03-27 19:30:31 UTC

Will “AI” chatbots be the tobacco of the future?
Towards the end of 2024, Dennis Biesma decided to check out ChatGPT. The Amsterdam-based IT consultant had just ended a contract early. “I had some time, so I thought: let’s have a look at this new technology everyone is talking about,” he says. “Very quickly, I became fascinated.”
Biesma has asked himself why he was vulnerable t
https://www.osnews.com/story/144693/will-ai-chatbots-be-the-tobacco-of-the-future/
#Technofascism

2026-03-27 19:18:29 UTC

Microsoft removes trust for drivers signed with the cross-signed driver program
Today, we’re excited to announce a significant step forward in our ongoing commitment to Windows security and system reliability: the removal of trust for all kernel drivers signed by the deprecated cross-signed root program. This update will help protect our customers by ensu
https://www.osnews.com/story/144691/microsoft-removes-trust-for-drivers-signed-with-the-cross-signed-driver-program/
#Windows

2026-03-26 23:01:51 UTC

Windows 95 defenses against installers that overwrite a file with an older version
I'll never grow tired of reading about the crazy tricks the Windows 95 development team employed to make the user experience as seamless as they could given the constraints they were dealing with. During the 16bit Windows days, application installers could replace system c
https://www.osnews.com/story/144687/windows-95-defenses-against-installers-that-overwrite-a-file-with-an-older-version/
#Windows

2026-03-26 22:41:31 UTC

US regulator bans imports of new foreign-made routers, citing security concerns
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Monday it was banning the import of all new foreign-made consumer routers, the latest crackdown on Chinese-made electronic gear over ‌security concerns.
China is estimated to control at least 60% of the U.S. market for home rou
https://www.osnews.com/story/144685/us-regulator-bans-imports-of-new-foreign-made-routers-citing-security-concerns/
#Legal

2026-03-26 22:34:17 UTC

Apple discontinues the Mac Pro with no plans for future hardware
It’s the end of an era: Apple has confirmed to 9to5Mac that the Mac Pro is being discontinued. It has been removed from Apple’s website as of Thursday afternoon. The “buy” page on Apple’s website for the Mac Pro now redirects to the Mac’s homepage, where all references have been removed.
Apple has also conf
https://www.osnews.com/story/144682/apple-discontinues-the-mac-pro-with-no-plans-for-future-hardware/
#Apple

2026-03-25 21:07:38 UTC

The reports of age verification in Linux are greatly exaggerated, for now
Several US states, the country of Brazil, and I'm sure other places in the world have enacted or are planning to enact laws that would place the burden of age verification of users on the shoulders of operating system makers. The legal landscape is quite fragmented at this point, and there's n
https://www.osnews.com/story/144653/the-reports-of-age-verification-in-linux-are-greatly-exaggerated-for-now/
#Legal

2026-03-23 15:13:43 UTC

Windows native application development is a mess
Usually, when developers or programmers write articles about their experiences developing for a platform they have little to no experience with, the end result usually comes down to "they do things differently, therefor it is bad actually", which is deeply unhelpful. This article, though, is from a longtime Windows user and developer, but
https://www.osnews.com/story/144650/windows-native-application-development-is-a-mess/
#Windows

2026-03-23 14:52:23 UTC

Java Sun SPOTs (Small Programable Object Technology)
These were Sun microcontrollers that run Squawk Java ME directly on metal with gc and all the bells and whistles, created by Sun Microsystems in 2005.
The feature mesh networking and tcp/ip and multitasking. Even the drivers are java just like Java OS.
They run a command and control server by default and there’s graphical
https://www.osnews.com/story/144648/java-sun-spots-small-programable-object-technology/
#OracleAndSUN

2026-03-23 14:44:12 UTC

The OpenBSD init system and boot process
In recent weeks, systemd has both embraced slopcoding and laid the groundwork for age verification built right into systemd-based Linux distributions, there's definitely been an uptick in people talking about alternative init systems. If you want to gain understanding in a rather classic init system, OpenBSD's is a great place to start.
OpenBSD has a
https://www.osnews.com/story/144646/the-openbsd-init-system-and-boot-process/
#OpenBSD

2026-03-20 23:02:41 UTC

Microsoft finally makes a few concrete promises about Windows 11 improvements
Earlier this year, Microsoft openly acknowledged the sorry state of Windows 11, and made vague promises about possible improvements somewhere in the near future, but stayed away from making any concrete promises. Today, the company published a blog post with some more details, inclu
https://www.osnews.com/story/144638/microsoft-finally-makes-a-few-concrete-promises-about-windows-11-improvements/
#Windows

2026-03-19 23:51:43 UTC

Google to introduce overly onerous hoops to prevent “sideloading”
When Google said they were going to require verification from every single Android developer that would end the ability to install applications from outside of the Play Store (commonly wrongfully referred to as "sideloading"), it caused quite a backlash. The company then backtracked a little bit, and sai
https://www.osnews.com/story/144635/google-to-introduce-overly-onerous-hoops-to-prevent-sideloading/
#Android

2026-03-19 21:10:31 UTC

You can make Linux syscalls in a Windows application, apparently
What happens if you make a Linux syscall in a Windows application?
So yeah, you can make Linux syscalls from Windows programs, as long as they're running under Wine. Totally useless, but the fact that such a Frankenstein monster of a program could exist is funny to me.
↫ nicebyte at gpfault.net
https://www.osnews.com/story/144633/you-can-make-linux-syscalls-in-a-windows-application-apparently/
#GeneralDevelopment

2026-03-18 22:23:46 UTC

GNOME 50 released
The GNOME team has released GNOME 50, the latest version of what is probably the most popular open source desktop environment. It brings fine-grained parental controls, and the groundwork for web filtering so that in future releases, parents and guardians can set content filters for children. Our own kids are still way too young to have access to computers and the internet, but I'm not sure I'll ever r
https://www.osnews.com/story/144629/gnome-50-released/
#Gnome

2026-03-18 21:14:57 UTC

Introducing Duranium: an immutable variant of postmarketOS
PosrtmarketOS, the Linux 'distribution' for mobile devices, now also has an immutable variant, called Duranium.
Duranium is an immutable variant of postmarketOS, built around the idea that your device should just work, and keep working. You shouldn't need to know what a terminal is to keep your device running.
"Imm
https://www.osnews.com/story/144627/introducing-duranium-an-immutable-variant-of-postmarketos/
#Mobile

2026-03-18 21:01:29 UTC

Sudo ported to DOS
DOS didn't have sudo yet. This gross oversight has been addressed.
SUDO examines the environment for the COMSPEC variable to find the default command interpreter, falling back to C:\COMMAND.COM if not set. The interpreter is then executed in unprotected real mode for full privileges.
↫ SUDO for DOS' Codeberg page
A vital tool, for sure.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144625/sudo-ported-to-dos/
#RetroComputing

2026-03-18 19:42:50 UTC

Meta and TikTok let harmful content rise after evidence outrage drove engagement, say whistleblowers
Once again, social media giants Facebook and TikTok have been caught red-handed.
More than a dozen whistleblowers and insiders have laid bare how the companies took risks with safety on issues including violence, sexual blackmai
https://www.osnews.com/story/144623/meta-and-tiktok-let-harmful-content-rise-after-evidence-outrage-drove-engagement-say-whistleblowers/
#Technofascism

2026-03-18 14:38:49 UTC

How kernel anti-cheats work: a deep dive into modern game protection
Modern kernel anti-cheat systems are, without exaggeration, among the most sophisticated pieces of software running on consumer Windows machines. They operate at the highest privilege level available to software, they intercept kernel callbacks that were designed for legitimate security products, they s
https://www.osnews.com/story/144616/how-kernel-anti-cheats-work-a-deep-dive-into-modern-game-protection/
#Games

2026-03-17 22:09:53 UTC

Tribblix m39 released
Tribblix, the Illumos distribution focused on giving you a classic UNIX-style experience, has released a new version.
There are several noticeable version updates in this release. The graphical libraries libtiff and OpenEXR have been updated, retaining the old shared library versions for now. OpenSSL is now from the 3.5 series with the 3.0 api by default. Bind is now from the 9.20 series.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144613/tribblix-m39-released/
#Solaris

2026-03-17 21:32:12 UTC

Java 26 released
Java 26 delivers thousands of improvements that boost developer productivity, simplify the language, and help developers integrate AI and cryptography functionality into their applications. To help developers further streamline and enhance their development initiatives, Oracle is also announcing the new Java Verified Portfolio, which provides developers with a curated set of Oracle-supported tools, framew
https://www.osnews.com/story/144611/java-26-released/
#Java

2026-03-16 22:07:42 UTC

Han: a compiled programming language with Korean keywords written in Hangul
Since many of the platforms and conventions that came to dominate computing came from the western world, we never give it a second thought that virtually everything related to programming is written in English using the English alphabet. However, there's no real reason behind
https://www.osnews.com/story/144603/han-a-compiled-programming-language-with-korean-keywords-written-in-hangul/
#GeneralDevelopment

2026-03-16 21:39:59 UTC

Microsoft finally allows you to name your own home folder during Windows setup
It's only a small annoyance in the grand scheme of the utter idiocy that is modern Windows, but apparently it's one enough people complained about Microsoft is finally addressing it. In all of its wisdom, Microsoft doesn't allow you to set the name of your user's home folder durin
https://www.osnews.com/story/144601/microsoft-finally-allows-you-to-name-your-own-home-folder-during-windows-setup/
#Windows

2026-03-14 21:06:27 UTC

CWMWrap: make UEFI-only systems boot BIOS-based operating systems
What if you have a very modern machine that is entirely UEFI-only, meaning it has no compatibility support module and thus no way of enabling a legacy BIOS mode? Well, install a CSM as an EFI application, of course!
CSMWrap is an EFI application designed to be a drop-in solution to enable legacy BIOS b
https://www.osnews.com/story/144596/cwmwrap-make-uefi-only-systems-boot-bios-based-operating-systems/
#Hardware

2026-03-13 23:49:40 UTC

Understanding SMF properties in Solaris-based operating systems
SMF is the illumos system for managing traditional Unix services (long-lived background processes, usually). It’s quite rich in order to correctly accommodate a lot of different use cases. But it sometimes exposes that complexity to users even when they’re trying to do something simple.
[...]
In this pos
https://www.osnews.com/story/144594/understanding-smf-properties-in-solaris-based-operating-systems/
#Solaris

2026-03-13 23:38:02 UTC

Chrome comes to Linux on ARM64
Google has announced that it will release Chrome for Linux on ARM64 in the second quarter of this year.
Launching Chrome for ARM64 Linux devices allows more users to enjoy the seamless integration of Google’s most helpful services into their browser. This move addresses the growing demand for a browsing experience that combines the benefits of the open-source Chromium pro
https://www.osnews.com/story/144592/chrome-comes-to-linux-on-arm64/
#Google

2026-03-13 23:13:13 UTC

Just try Plan 9 already
I will not pass up an opportunity to make you talk about Plan 9, so let's focus on Acme.
Acme is remarkable for what it represents: a class of application that leverages a simple, text-based GUI to create a compelling model of interacting with all of the tools available in the Unix (or Plan 9) environment. Cox calls it an “integrating development environment,” distinguishing it from th
https://www.osnews.com/story/144590/just-try-plan-9-already/
#OSNews

2026-03-13 21:33:03 UTC

Hello, world! in Z80 assembly language
I'm feeling kind of nostalgic today so I thought I'd write Hello, world! in Z80 assembly for the ZX Spectrum! The last time I wrote any Z80 assembly was when I was 14 so around 36 years ago! I may be a little rusty!
↫ Old Man By the Sea
It's easy to tell the world hello in BASIC, but a bit more involved in Z80 assembly.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144588/hello-world-in-z80-assembly-language/
#RetroComputing

2026-03-11 22:17:32 UTC

Fedora struggles bringing its RISC-V variant online due to slow build times
Red Hat developer Marcin Juszkiewicz is working on the RISC-V port of Fedora Linux, and after a few months of working on it, published a blog post about just how incredibly slow RISC-V seems to be. This is a real problem, as in Fedora, build results are only released once all archite
https://www.osnews.com/story/144582/fedora-struggles-bringing-its-risc-v-variant-online-due-to-slow-build-times/
#FedoraCore

2026-03-11 18:43:38 UTC

Amazon enters “find out” phase
Now let's go live to Amazon for the latest updates about this developing story.
Amazon’s ecommerce business has summoned a large group of engineers to a meeting on Tuesday for a “deep dive” into a spate of outages, including incidents tied to the use of AI coding tools.
The online retail giant said there had been a “trend of incidents” in recent months, characteriz
https://www.osnews.com/story/144580/amazon-enters-find-out-phase/
#ClownCar

2026-03-10 22:56:54 UTC

You’re supposed to replace the stock photos in new picture frames
Back in 2023, John Earnest created a fun drawing application called WigglyPaint. The thing that makes WigglyPaint unique is that it automatically applies what artists call the line boil effect to anything you draw, making it seem as if everything is wiggling (hence the name). Even if you're not aware of
https://www.osnews.com/story/144576/youre-supposed-to-replace-the-stock-photos-in-new-picture-frames/
#ClownCar

2026-03-10 20:57:15 UTC

Redox bans code regurgitated by “AI”
Redox, the rapidly improving general purpose operating system written in Rust, has amended its contribution policy to explicitly ban code regurgitated by "AI".
Redox OS does not accept contributions generated by LLMs (Large Language Models), sometimes also referred to as "AI". This policy is not open to discussion, any content submitted that is clearly labe
https://www.osnews.com/story/144574/redox-bans-code-regurgitated-by-ai/
#RedoxOS

2026-03-10 16:19:35 UTC

FreeBSD 14.4 released
While FreeBSD 15.x may be getting all the attention, the FreeBSD 14.x branch continues to be updated for the more conservative users among us. FreeBSD 14.4 has been released today, and brings with it updated versions of OpenSSH, OpenZFS, and Bhyve virtual machines can now share files with their host over 9pfs - among other things, of course.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144572/freebsd-14-4-released/
#FreeBSD

2026-03-09 23:32:06 UTC

ArcaOS 5.1.2 released
While IBM's OS/2 technically did die, its development was picked up again much later, first through eComStation, and later, after money issues at its parent company Mensys, through ArcaOS. eComStation development stalled because of the money issues and has been dead for years; ArcaOS picked up where it left off and has been making steady progress since its first release in 2017. Regardless, the d
https://www.osnews.com/story/144553/arcaos-5-1-2-released/
#OS2

2026-03-09 21:40:58 UTC

“AI” translations are ruining Wikipedia
Oh boy.
Wikipedia editors have implemented new policies and restricted a number of contributors who were paid to use AI to translate existing Wikipedia articles into other languages after they discovered these AI translations added AI “hallucinations,” or errors, to the resulting article.
↫ Emanuel Maiberg at 404 Media
There seems to be this perva
https://www.osnews.com/story/144567/ai-translations-are-ruining-wikipedia/
#ClownCar

2026-03-09 21:18:22 UTC

I don’t know what is Apple’s endgame for the Fn/Globe key, and I’m not sure Apple knows either
Every modifier key starts simple and humble, with a specific task and a nice matching name.
This never lasts. The tasks become larger and more convoluted, and the labels grow obsolete. Shift no longer shifts a carriage, Control doesn’t send contr
https://www.osnews.com/story/144564/i-dont-know-what-is-apples-endgame-for-the-fn-globe-key-and-im-not-sure-apple-knows-either/
#Apple

2026-03-09 17:33:49 UTC

MenuetOS 1.59.20 released
MenuetOS, the operating system written in x86-64 assembly, has released two new versions since we last talked about it roughly two months ago. In fact, I'm not actually sure it's just two, or more, or fewer, since it seems sometimes releases disappear entirely from the changelog, making things a bit unclear. Anyway, since the last time we talked about MenuetOS, it got improvements to v
https://www.osnews.com/story/144562/menuetos-1-59-20-released/
#OSNews

2026-03-06 21:31:53 UTC

Haiku inches closer to next beta release
And when a Redox monthly progress report is here, Haiku's monthly report is never far behind (or vice versa, depending on the month). Haiku's February was definitely a busy month, but there's no major tentpole changes or new features, highlighting just how close Haiku is to a new regular beta release. The OpenBSD drivers have been synchronised wit upstream
https://www.osnews.com/story/144556/haiku-inches-closer-to-next-beta-release/
#Haiku

2026-03-06 21:24:11 UTC

Redox gets NodeJS, COSMIC’s compositor, and much more
February has been a busy month for Redox, the general purpose operating system written in Rust. For instance, the COSMIC compositor can now run on Redox as a winit window, the first step towards fully porting the compositor from COSMIC to Redox. Similarly, COSMIC Settings now also runs on Redox, albeit with only a very small numbe
https://www.osnews.com/story/144554/redox-gets-nodejs-cosmics-compositor-and-much-more/
#RedoxOS

2026-03-05 22:23:44 UTC

Hardware hotplug events on Linux, the gory details
One day, I suddenly wondered how to detect when a USB device is plugged or unplugged from a computer running Linux. For most users, this would be solved by relying on libusb. However, the use case I was investigating might not actually want to do so, and so this led me down a poorly-documented rabbit hole.
↫ ArcaneNibble (or R)
And Arc
https://www.osnews.com/story/144551/hardware-hotplug-events-on-linux-the-gory-details/
#Linux

2026-03-05 21:23:09 UTC

New Oracle Solaris CBE release released
Oracle's Solaris 11 basically comes in two different flavours: the SRU (Support Repository Update) releases for commercial Oracle customers, and the CBE (Common Build Environment) releases, available to everyone. We've covered the last few SRU releases, and now it's time for a new CBE release.
We first introduced the Oracle Solaris CBE in March 2022 and
https://www.osnews.com/story/144549/new-oracle-solaris-cbe-release-released/
#Solaris

2026-03-05 21:07:42 UTC

The great license-washing has begun
In the world of open source, relicensing is notoriously difficult. It usually requires the unanimous consent of every person who has ever contributed a line of code, a feat nearly impossible for legacy projects. chardet, a Python character encoding detector used by requests and many others, has sat in that tension for years: as a port of Mozilla’s C++ code it was bou
https://www.osnews.com/story/144547/the-great-license-washing-has-begun/
#Legal

2026-03-05 19:19:39 UTC

DOS memory management
The memory management in DOS is simple, but that simplicity may be deceptive. There are several rather interesting pitfalls that programming documentation often does not mention.
↫ Michal Necasek at the OS/2 Museum
A must-read for people writing software for earlier DOS versions.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144545/dos-memory-management/
#RetroComputing

2026-03-04 22:47:32 UTC

Lock scroll with a vengeance
What's the scroll lock key actually for?
Scroll Lock was reportedly specifically added for spreadsheets, and it solved a very specific problem: before mice and trackpads, and before fast graphic cards, moving through a spreadsheet was a nightmare. Just like Caps Lock flipped the meaning of letter keys, and Num Lock that of the numeric keypad keys, Scroll Lock attempted to f
https://www.osnews.com/story/144534/lock-scroll-with-a-vengeance/
#Hardware

2026-03-04 22:36:44 UTC

The new MacBook Neo is a great deal in the US, not so much in Europe
Apple today announced the "MacBook Neo," an all-new kind of low-cost Mac featuring the A18 Pro chip for $599.
The MacBook Neo is the first Mac to be powered by an iPhone chip; the A18 Pro debuted in 2024's iPhone 16 Pro models. Apple says it is up to 50% faster for everyday tasks than the bestselling
https://www.osnews.com/story/144532/the-new-macbook-neo-is-a-great-deal-in-the-us-not-so-much-in-europe/
#Apple

2026-03-04 00:27:39 UTC

- reply

No? It's not?
What are you on about? It's a short article that starts with two quoted paragraphs from another website, followed by several paragraphs by me (@npub13jw…j6a3) about said paragraphs. None of it is "AI", and there's zero reason to assume it is so.

2026-03-03 23:46:06 UTC

- reply

You know you can click the link and open the article, right? There's more than just this tidbit.

2026-03-03 23:38:33 UTC

Never bet against x86
Chips and Cheese has an excellent deep dive into Arm's latest core design, and I have thoughts.
Arm now has a core with enough performance to take on not only laptop, but also desktop use cases. They’ve also shown it’s possible to deliver that performance at a modest 4 GHz clock speed. Arm achieved that by executing well on the fundamentals throughout the core pipeline. X925’s branch pre
https://www.osnews.com/story/144527/never-bet-against-x86/
#Hardware

2026-03-03 22:14:39 UTC

The 64-bit Hurd for Gux is here
Fifteen months have passed since our last Guix/Hurd on a Thinkpad X60 post and a lot has happened with respect to the Hurd.
And most of you will have guessed, unless you skipped the title of this post, the rumored x86_64 support has landed in Guix!
↫ Janneke Nieuwenhuizen and Yelninei at the Guix blog
A huge amount of work has gone into this effort over the past 18 mo
https://www.osnews.com/story/144525/the-64-bit-hurd-for-gux-is-here/
#OSNews

2026-03-02 22:51:29 UTC

Setting up phones is a nightmare
Have you bought and set up a new phone for someone else lately, especially someone less technologically savvy? It's a bit of a nightmare, with an endless list of confusing steps and dark patterns trying to trick you into signing up for all kinds of services. Joel Chrono (he took his username from the best game ever made) just went through this experience, with new Samsung
https://www.osnews.com/story/144520/setting-up-phones-is-a-nightmare/
#Mobile

2026-03-02 20:17:47 UTC

Microsoft really doesn’t want you to use the name “Microslop”
Microsoft is pushing "AI" hard in Windows, Office, and in their other products, and it's earned them a cute new nickname: Microslop. It turns out the company really doesn't like it when you use this nickname, however, and its official Copilot Discord server - yes, there is an official one - has gone into a co
https://www.osnews.com/story/144518/microsoft-really-doesnt-want-you-to-use-the-name-microslop/
#Microsoft

2026-03-02 13:44:39 UTC

KDE makes steady progress on Union, its unified theme engine
If you're following KDE Plasma development, you've most likely run into something called Union, a project KDE is working on to unify their various ways of theming their applications. The problem KDE is facing right now is that after so many decades of development and changes in how people want to develop applications, th
https://www.osnews.com/story/144515/kde-makes-steady-progress-on-union-its-unified-theme-engine/
#KDE

2026-03-01 21:09:22 UTC

You can use newline characters in URLs
I had no idea, but apparently, you can just use newline characters and tabs in URLs without any issues.
Notice how it reports an error if there is a tab or newline character, but continues anyway? The specification says that A validation error does not mean that the parser terminates and it encourages systems to report errors somewhere. Effectively, the
https://www.osnews.com/story/144513/you-can-use-newline-characters-in-urls/
#Internet

2026-02-28 22:09:29 UTC

Run this random script in the terminal to block Apple’s macOS Tahoe update notification spam
Are you not at all interested in upgrading to macOS Tahoe, and getting annoyed at the relentless notification spam from Apple trying to trick you into upgrading?
The secret? Using device management profiles, which let you enforce policies on Macs in
https://www.osnews.com/story/144511/run-this-random-script-in-the-terminal-to-block-apples-macos-tahoe-update-notification-spam/
#macOS

2026-02-28 21:10:16 UTC

The Windows 95 user interface: a case study in usability engineering
If this isn't catnip to the average OSNews reader, I don't know what is.
Windows 95 is a comprehensive upgrade to the Windows 3.1 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 products. Many changes have been made in almost every area of Windows, with the user interface being no exception. This paper discusses
https://www.osnews.com/story/144509/the-windows-95-user-interface-a-case-study-in-usability-engineering/
#Windows

2026-02-28 20:54:17 UTC

Bootc and OSTree: modernizing Linux system deployment
Bootc and OSTree represent a new way of thinking about Linux system deployment and management. Building on container and versioning concepts, they offer robust and modern solutions to meet the current needs of administrators and developers.
↫ Quentin Joly
Slowly, very slowly, I've been starting to warm up to the relatively new cr
https://www.osnews.com/story/144506/bootc-and-ostree-modernizing-linux-system-deployment/
#Linux

2026-02-27 23:25:26 UTC

Windows Server Insider builds can now boot from ReFS
The file system of the Windows operating system is NTFS, whether you're running it on a desktop/laptop or server. It's the only file system Windows can run on and boot from, at least officially, so you're not even given a choice of file systems for the boot volume like you are on, say, desktop Linux. That's about to change, though:
https://www.osnews.com/story/144503/windows-server-insider-builds-can-now-boot-from-refs/
#Windows

2026-02-27 22:19:23 UTC

US lawmakers push for age verification at the operating system level
Encryption backdoors, social media bans for children, creepy age verification for applications - what will they think of next? The latest brilliant idea by US lawmakers sure is a hell of a doozy: legally mandated age verification in every single operating system.
Colorado's SB26-051, introduced
https://www.osnews.com/story/144501/us-lawmakers-push-for-age-verification-at-the-operating-system-level/
#ClownCar

2026-02-27 21:59:30 UTC

Jails for NetBSD
FreeBSD has its jails technology, and it seems NetBSD might be getting something similar soon.
Jails for NetBSD aims to bring lightweight, kernel-enforced isolation to NetBSD.
[...]
The system is intended to remain fully NetBSD-native. Isolation and policy enforcement are integrated into the kernel’s security framework rather than implemented in a separate runtime layer.
It does not aim to
https://www.osnews.com/story/144499/jails-for-netbsd/
#NetBSD

2026-02-26 23:19:44 UTC

Genode OS Framework 26.02 released
The Genode OS Framework 26.02 has been released, and its tentpole improvement is the completion of moving configuration from XML to the new human-inclined data syntax, as we talked about a few months ago. The project has been working on this for years, and now that the tooling, documentation, and so on have been added this release cycle, they're ready to make the swit
https://www.osnews.com/story/144494/genode-os-framework-26-02-released/
#Genode

2026-02-26 22:35:11 UTC

“Linuxulator on FreeBSD feels like magic”
You may not be aware that FreeBSD has a pretty robust set of tools to run Linux binaries, unmodified.
The result? A fast, smooth, fully-featured remote development experience on FreeBSD running Linux binaries transparently via the Linuxulator.
It genuinely feels like magic.
More importantly, it’s a testament to how stable the Linux ABI itself
https://www.osnews.com/story/144492/linuxulator-on-freebsd-feels-like-magic/
#FreeBSD

2026-02-26 22:34:35 UTC

US orders diplomats in the EU to fight data sovereignty initiatives
It seems the widespread efforts in Europe to drastically reduce its dependency on US technology companies is starting to worry some people.
President Donald Trump's administration has ordered U.S. diplomats to lobby against attempts to regulate U.S. tech companies' handling of foreigners' data, s
https://www.osnews.com/story/144490/us-orders-diplomats-in-the-eu-to-fight-data-sovereignty-initiatives/
#InTheNews

2026-02-25 23:26:10 UTC

“Never buy a .online domain”
I’ve been a .com purist for over two decades of building. Once, I broke that rule and bought a .online TLD for a small project. This is the story of how it went up in flames.
↫ Tony S.
An absolute horror story about Google's dominance over the web, in places nobody really talks about. Scary.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144487/never-buy-a-online-domain/
#Internet

2026-02-25 22:46:13 UTC

You can add a menu bar to KDE title bars with this tool, for some reason
Only a few days ago we talked about the concept of client-side decorations, and how more and more desktop environments and operating systems - specifically GNOME and macOS - are putting more and more buttons, menus, and other widgets inside title bars. How about we take this concept a step further
https://www.osnews.com/story/144484/you-can-add-a-menu-bar-to-kde-title-bars-with-this-tool-for-some-reason/
#KDE

2026-02-25 21:22:21 UTC

New Windows update adds Sysmon to Windows
Microsoft released a optional cumulative update for Windows 11, and for once, it actually includes something many of you might actually like: it adds Sysmon from Sysinternals to Windows natively, so you no longer have to install it manually. Here's a refresher on what, exactly, Sysmon does.
System Monitor (Sysmon) is a Windows system service and dev
https://www.osnews.com/story/144481/new-windows-update-adds-sysmon-to-windows/
#Windows

2026-02-24 22:48:24 UTC

If you’ve been holding on to a phone for a while, current phones are really disappointing
This must be a universal experience at this point for people who aren't swayed by the latest and greatest marketing hype around new phone models: there's just nothing out there that fits one's needs.
When I walked into a phone shop, I expected to witness w
https://www.osnews.com/story/144477/if-youve-been-holding-on-to-a-phone-for-a-while-current-phones-are-really-disappointing/
#Mobile

2026-02-24 20:21:30 UTC

The age-verification trap: verifying user’s ages undermines everyone’s data protection
Social media is going the way of alcohol, gambling, and other social sins: Societies are deciding it’s no longer kid stuff. Lawmakers point to compulsive use, exposure to harmful content, and mounting concerns about adolescent mental health. So, many propose to s
https://www.osnews.com/story/144475/the-age-verification-trap-verifying-users-ages-undermines-everyones-data-protection/
#Internet

2026-02-23 23:25:22 UTC

GTK-NoCSD: an LD_PRELOAD library to disable CSDs
While Libadwaita applications running in a GNOME desktop environment look great and nicely consistent, they look utterly out of place and jarring when run in Xfce, Pantheon, KDE, and others. The biggest reason for this is GNOME's insistence on using client-side decorations, which feel at home inside a GNOME environment, but out of place in envi
https://www.osnews.com/story/144473/gtk-nocsd-an-ld_preload-library-to-disable-csds/
#GTK

2026-02-23 21:46:24 UTC

OpenBSD: anatomy of bsd.rd
Every OpenBSD admin has booted bsd.rd at least once — to install, upgrade, or rescue a broken system. But few people stop to look at what’s actually inside that file. It turns out bsd.rd is a set of nested layers, and you can take it apart on a running system without rebooting anything.
That’s what we’ll do here. We’ll go from the raw gzip file all the way down to the miniroot fil
https://www.osnews.com/story/144471/openbsd-anatomy-of-bsd-rd/
#OpenBSD

2026-02-21 13:59:45 UTC

Microsoft announces ESU program for Windows Server 2016, 10 Enterprise LTSB, and 10 IoT Enterprise 2016 LTSB
The regular, consumer version of Windows 10 isn't the only Windows release reaching or having reached end-of-life, now middling on under the Extended Security Updates program for the many people sticking with the venerable
https://www.osnews.com/story/144467/microsoft-announces-esu-program-for-windows-server-2016-10-enterprise-ltsb-and-10-iot-enterprise-2016-ltsb/
#Windows

2026-02-21 12:09:46 UTC

Oracle Solaris 11.4 SRU90 released
Despite continuous rumors to the contrary, Oracle is still actively developing Solaris, and it's been more active than ever lately. Yesterday, the company pushed out another release for customers with the proper support contracts: Oracle Solaris 11.4 SRU90. Aside from the various package updates to bring them up to speed with the latest releases, this new Solaris ver
https://www.osnews.com/story/144465/oracle-solaris-11-4-sru90-released/
#Solaris

2026-02-21 07:34:08 UTC

Blue-light filters are pure quackery
I was trading New Year’s resolutions with a circle of friends a few weeks ago, and someone mentioned a big one: sleeping better. I’m a visual neuroscientist by training, so whenever the topic pops up it inevitably leads to talking about the dreaded blue light from monitors, blue light filters, and whether they do anything. My short answer is no, blue light filt
https://www.osnews.com/story/144463/blue-light-filters-are-pure-quackery/
#InTheNews

2026-02-19 21:27:52 UTC

Windows 11 26H1 will be Snapdragon-specific
As if keeping track of whatever counts as a release schedule for Windows wasn't complicated enough - don't lie, you don't know when that feature they announced is actually being released either - Microsoft is making everything even more complicated. Soon, Microsoft will be releasing Windows 11 26H1, but you most likely won't be getting it because it
https://www.osnews.com/story/144461/windows-11-26h1-will-be-snapdragon-specific/
#Windows

2026-02-19 01:06:42 UTC

Undo in Vi and its successors
So vi only has one level of undo, which is simply no longer fit for the times we live in now, and also wholly unnecessary given even the least powerful devices that might need to run vi probably have more than enough resources to give at least a few more levels of undo. What I didn't know, however, is that vi's limited undo behaviour is actually part of POSIX, and for full compli
https://www.osnews.com/story/144459/undo-in-vi-and-its-successors/
#Unix

2026-02-18 22:08:30 UTC

F9: an L4-style microkernel for ARM Cortex-M
F9 is an L4-inspired microkernel designed for ARM Cortex-M, targeting real-time embedded systems with hard determinism requirements. It implements the fundamental microkernel principles—address spaces, threads, and IPC, while adding advanced features from industrial RTOSes.
↫ F9 kernel GitHub page
For once, not written in Rust, and comes with bot
https://www.osnews.com/story/144430/f9-an-l4-style-microkernel-for-arm-cortex-m/
#OSNews

2026-02-18 21:54:35 UTC

Windows 11’s new MIDI framework delivers MIDI 2.0
It's been well over a year since Microsoft unveiled it was working on bringing MIDI 2.0 to Windows, and now it's actually here available for everyone.
We’ve been working on MIDI over the past several years, completely rewriting decades of MIDI 1.0 code on Windows to both support MIDI 2.0 and make MIDI 1.0 amazing. This new combined
https://www.osnews.com/story/144428/windows-11s-new-midi-framework-delivers-midi-2-0/
#Windows

2026-02-18 00:07:10 UTC

KDE Plasma 6.6 released
KDE Plasma 6.6 has been released, and brings with a whole slew of new features. You can save any combination of themes as a global theme, and there's a new feature allowing you to increase or decrease the contrast of frames and outlines. If your device has a camera, you can now scan Wi-F settings from QR codes, which is quite nice if you spend a lot of time on the road.
There's a new colou
https://www.osnews.com/story/144424/kde-plasma-6-6-released/
#KDE

2026-02-17 23:30:38 UTC

SvarDOS: an open-source DOS distribution
SvarDOS is an open-source project that is meant to integrate the best out of the currently available DOS tools, drivers and games. DOS development has been abandoned by commercial players a long time ago, mostly during early nineties. Nowadays it survives solely through the efforts of hobbyists and retro-enthusiasts, but this is a highly sparse and
https://www.osnews.com/story/144420/svardos-an-open-source-dos-distribution/
#RetroComputing

2026-02-17 22:35:04 UTC

Proper Linux on your wrist: AsteroidOS 2.0 released
It's been a while since we've talked about AsteroidOS, the Linux distribution designed specifically to run on smartwatches, providing a smartwatch interface and applications built with Qt and QML. The project has just released version 2.0, and it comes with a ton of improvements.
AsteroidOS 2.0 has arrived, bringing major features
https://www.osnews.com/story/144418/proper-linux-on-your-wrist-asteroidos-2-0-released/
#Mobile

2026-02-17 22:19:08 UTC

A deep dive into Apple’s .car file format
Every modern iOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS application uses Asset Catalogs to manage images, colors, icons, and other resources. When you build an app with Xcode, your .xcassets folders are compiled into binary .car files that ship with your application. Despite being a fundamental part of every Apple app, there is little to none official documentation ab
https://www.osnews.com/story/144416/a-deep-dive-into-apples-car-file-format/
#Apple