By now it is no secret that large language models (LLMs) have made it easy for people to identify security bugs, and that has resulted in a flood of bug reports to almost every free-software project, including the kernel. At the 2026 edition of Kernel Recipes, Greg Kroah-Hartman took the stage to talk about how the kernel's security team is handling this deluge. His core message was "don't panic".

Version 1.99.0 of the Rust language has been released. Changes this time include support for extern "C" variadic functions, the establishment of functions for obtaining the size and alignment of raw pointers, a number of stabilized APIs, and more.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (corosync, gawk, gdb, nodejs24, and thunderbird), Debian (expat, firefox-esr, libsmpp34, mkvtoolnix, network-manager-l2tp, pgextwlist, python-django, ruby-oj, and tor), Fedora (apptainer, ckermit, ffmpeg, freerdp, librabbitmq, openbao, php, python-cssselect2, python-uv-build, ruff, rust-libcst, rust-libcst_derive, rust-salsa, rust-salsa-macro-rules, rust-salsa-macros, sos, ty, uv, weasyprint, and xdg-dbus-proxy), Mageia (python-pillow), Red Hat (acl, glib2, go-toolset:rhel8, golang, libxml2, mingw-sqlite, nodejs-nodemon, nodejs22, nodejs24, nodejs:22, nodejs:24, sqlite, tesseract, and vim), Slackware (libpng and mozilla-thunderbird), SUSE (alloy, chromedriver, emacs, gdb, gimp, gpsd, jawn, libpoppler-cpp3, libtesseract5, multipath-tools, netty, ntfs-3g_ntfsprogs, pcapplusplus-devel, pi-coding-agent, python-PyYAML, python-tornado, python-tornado6, python311, python313, and wicked2nm), and Ubuntu (designate, gst-plugins-bad1.0, gvfs, imagemagick, kdenlive, mlt, keystone, libauthen-sasl-perl, linux-aws, linux-aws-6.8, linux-nvidia-tegra, linux-nvidia-tegra-igx, linux-oracle-7.0, opensbi, openvpn, and python-django).

Inside this week's LWN.net Weekly Edition:

• Front: PostgreSQL and the kernel; Rust on the GPU; KDE Plasma; C and memory safety; Rust radio; KDE funding; Chromium development.
• Briefs: File-notification attacks; Kernel report; TAB election; F-Droid 2.0; Firefox 157.0; GDB 18.1; Git v2.56.0; Quotes; ...
• Announcements: Newsletters, conferences, security updates, patches, and more.

The full set of videos from the recently concluded Kernel Recipes conference has been posted. Also noteworthy are the associated caricature drawings, by Frank Tizzoni, of attendees and the speakers.

The 2026 Python Language Summit was held on July 14 in Kraków, Poland; there is now a series of reports available on the topics that were discussed there. They include the memory buffer protocol, garbage collection, free-threaded Python, and "Spicycrab".

Sharon Yang is a Chromium developer who worked at Google on the browser and now works on it at Igalia. On the final day of FOSSY 2026, she gave a presentation on her experiences with both of those companies, comparing and contrasting the ways the each operates and how that affects work on the code base. She enjoyed working at Google and feels the same about Igalia, so the talk was not aimed at complaints—instead it was meant to give a feel for two companies that are rather different.

The election for members of the Linux Foundation Technical Advisory Board will be held electronically after the close of the upcoming Linux Plumbers Conference. The call for candidates is open, with a nomination deadline of October 8. There are five seats to fill this time, including the one vacated by the unfortunate passing of Dan Williams.

Serving on the TAB is a good way to help the kernel-development community. Please see this article from last year for an overview of what the TAB does and why membership is rewarding, then consider putting in your nomination.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (389-ds:1.4, container-tools:rhel8, go-toolset:rhel8, grafana, httpd:2.4, nodejs:22, postgresql:12, and postgresql:15), Debian (libwebsockets, openssl, and pcre2), Fedora (adwaita-icon-theme, cinnamon, dconf, epiphany, flatpak-builder, gcr, gdm, gjs, glib-networking, glib2, gnome-backgrounds, gnome-calendar, gnome-characters, gnome-chess, gnome-clocks, gnome-connections, gnome-console, gnome-contacts, gnome-control-center, gnome-desktop3, gnome-initial-setup, gnome-keyring, gnome-kiosk, gnome-maps, gnome-remote-desktop, gnome-settings-daemon, gnome-shell, gnome-shell-extensions, gnome-system-monitor, gnome-text-editor, gnome-user-docs, gnote, gnucash, gnucash-docs, gsettings-desktop-schemas, gtk4, hplip, libadwaita, libdex, libsecret, libshumate, libxmp, mingw-llvm, mutter, nautilus, parted, perl-Imager, quadrapassel, rootlesskit, rygel, shotwell, sngrep, sushi, sysprof, tecla, thunderbird, xdg-desktop-portal-gnome, and xdotool), Red Hat (buildah, container-tools:rhel8, containernetworking-plugins, delve, git-lfs, grafana, grafana-pcp, host-metering, ignition, image-builder, osbuild-composer, podman, rhc, rhc-worker-playbook, runc, skopeo, yggdrasil, and yggdrasil-worker-package-manager), Slackware (mozilla-firefox), SUSE (389-ds, amazon-cloudwatch-agent, cjose, corosync, cosign, cups, distribution-registry, expat, firefox, flatpak, glib2, google-osconfig-agent, goose, helm, ImageMagick, jackson-annotations, jackson-bom, jackson-core, jackson- databind, jackson-dataformat-xml, jackson-dataformats-binary, jackson-modules- base, jackson-core, jackson-databind, jackson-dataformat-csv, jsoup, re2j, kbd, kernel, kubectl-cnpg, libpcap, libsoup, libtpms, libX11, libXrender, netty, netty-tcnative, pcre2, perl-Authen-SASL, perl-DBI, python-pymongo, python310, python311, swtpm, terraform-provider-susepubliccloud, and util-linux), and Ubuntu (atril, booth, c-ares, catdoc, dracut, emacs, erlang, freeipmi, libdbi-perl, libheif, linux, linux-aws, linux-azure, linux-fips, linux-gcp, linux-gcp-5.4, linux-gcp-fips, linux-hwe-5.4, linux-iot, linux-kvm, linux-oracle, linux-oracle-5.4, linux-raspi, linux-xilinx-zynqmp, linux, linux-nvidia, linux-aws-fips, linux-aws-fips, linux-azure-fips, linux-fips, linux-bluefield, linux-fips, linux-nvidia-tegra-5.15, openssl, openssl, openssl1.0, pdfminer, php-phpseclib, and plasma-workspace).

Version 157.0 of the Firefox browser has been released. It features "Firefox's biggest visual refresh in years", the ability to use hardware AV1 decoding with WebRTC calls, and a number of fixes.

Andres Freund has a few claims to fame, but chief among them is his many years of work to improve the performance of the PostgreSQL relational database management system. That work requires working with — or around — many Linux kernel features and behaviors. He put in an appearance at the 2026 edition of Kernel Recipes to talk about his experience working with the kernel project, how the kernel could better support applications like PostgreSQL, and some interesting developments in the PostgreSQL world.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (cockpit-image-builder, expat, ipa, kernel, kernel-rt, resteasy, ruby, ruby4.0, ruby:3.3, and ruby:4.0), Debian (dovecot, flatpak, glance, kernel, libdbi-perl, lxml, rsync, swift, and wordpress), Fedora (chromium, freeipa, freerdp, grub2, NetworkManager-iodine, NetworkManager-l2tp, perl-Catalyst-Plugin-Static-Simple, perl-Dancer2, perl-HTML-FormFu, python-quart-trio, python-streamlink, python-urllib3, and vlc), Mageia (libxml2, p11-kit, pam, and php), Slackware (groff and pcre2), SUSE (389-ds, amazon-ssm-agent, erlang27, exiv2, glib2, gnome-shell, hplip, ImageMagick, kernel, libheif, libsodium, libtpms, nodejs16, perl-DBI, python-soupsieve, redis, redis7, swtpm, and wireshark), and Ubuntu (curl, libevent, linux-aws, linux-aws-6.8, linux-aws-5.15, linux-azure-5.15, linux-azure-fde-5.15, linux-intel-iotg-5.15, linux-aws-hwe, linux-azure, linux-azure-4.15, linux-gcp, linux-gcp-7.0, linux-oem-7.0, linux-nvidia, linux-nvidia-6.8, linux-nvidia-lowlatency, and linux-oracle-7.0).

Version 2.56 of the Git distributed version-control system has been released. It has 748 non-merge commits since Git 2.55 was released back in June; those commits came from 104 developers, 39 of whom are first-time contributors. New features include a safer workflow for conflict resolution, smaller path-walk repacks, a new git history drop sub-command, and much more. LWN looked at Git 2.56 recently and the GitHub blog has a lengthy look at 2.56 as well.

As a professor of biomedical engineering, Martin Uecker perhaps does not fit the profile of a typical presenter at Kernel Recipes. He is, however, a longtime Linux user, and works on free software for controlling magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners. He was at the conference to talk about the C programming language, the specific problem of undefined behavior in C, and whether it can eventually be made into a memory-safe language.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (firefox, ipa, kernel, libxml2, perl-DBI, python-cryptography, thunderbird, and unbound), Debian (chromium, evolution-data-server, exim4, ghostscript, incus, lemonldap-ng, libheif, nodejs, php8.4, ruby-oj, swift, and vlc), Fedora (chromium, cinnamon, cinnamon-desktop, cinnamon-session, cinnamon-settings-daemon, ckermit, dnf5, forgejo, goose, gssntlmssp, libheif, libpcap, librsvg2, mingw-gstreamer1, mingw-gstreamer1-plugins-bad-free, mingw-gstreamer1-plugins-base, mingw-gstreamer1-plugins-good, mingw-python3, mongo-c-driver, muffin, nemo, nemo-extensions, nextcloud, pgadmin4, postgresql16-postgis, postgresql17-postgis, postgresql18-postgis, rust-librsvg, rust-xml5ever, sipp, suricata, tesseract, and xreader), Mageia (erlang, gpsd, libreswan, python3 & python-pip, and udisks2), Oracle (abrt, buildah, cockpit-image-builder, corosync, ipa, kernel, libxml2, openexr, perl-DBI, perl-DBI:1.641, postgresql, thunderbird, unbound, and yelp), SUSE (389-ds, ansible-lint, cups, firefox, flatpak-builder, forgejo-longterm, gdb, gimp, gitoxide, glib2, gnome-shell, google-guest-agent, google-osconfig-agent, haveged, helm, ImageMagick, kbd, libsoup, libtpms, obs-service-cargo, openai-codex, opensuse-signkey-cert, osmo-iuh, perl-mojolicious, poppler, python-WebOb, python-WebOb-doc, python313-vllm, python314, sdbootutil, suseconnect-ng, and swtpm), and Ubuntu (exim4, freerdp3, libvirt, libvirt-hwe, libwebsockets, lxc, pyjwt, and requests).

The 7.3-rc5 kernel prepatch is out for testing. Linus said: "I don't think there's any real pattern to it other than 'big'. But nothing looks particularly alarming, I think that despite the diffstat it's just the same old, same old."

Version 18.1 of the GDB interactive debugger has been released. Changes include new commands to manipulate the environment of the subprocess, the ability to save the command history to a file, support for a couple of new targets, several Python API additions, and more. See the NEWS file for the complete list.