KDE Eco, a KDE project focused on reducing software's environmental impact, has announced its Opt Green campaign to reduce e-waste:

Over the next two years, the "Opt Green" initiative will bring what KDE Eco has been doing for sustainable software directly to end users. A particular target group for the project is those whose consumer behavior is driven by principles related to the environment, and not just price or convenience: the "eco-consumers".

Through online and offline campaigns as well as installation workshops, we will demonstrate the power of Free Software to drive down resource and energy consumption, and keep devices in use for the lifespan of the hardware, not the software.

Our motto: The most environmentally-friendly device is the one you already own.

See the KDE Eco Get Involved page for more information on how to participate.

The Asahi Linux project works to support Linux on Apple Silicon hardware. The project's flagship distribution is the Fedora Asahi Remix, which has its own installer (rather than Anaconda) to accommodate the unique requirements of installing on Apple's hardware. Previously the installer was built by the Asahi project, but it has asked for (and received) an exception from the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee (FESCo) to include two binaries from upstream open-source projects so that the installer can be built on Fedora infrastructure.

The FreeBSD Foundation has announced the 2024 FreeBSD Community Survey Report. The report provides a summary of 1,446 responses to an anonymous online survey of FreeBSD users. It provides insights into user profiles, typical usage, how the FreeBSD project is viewed, as well as recommendations for expanding the FreeBSD community and contributor base:

Currently fewer than half of users consider FreeBSD their daily driver; Individuals are less likely than Corporate Users to consider FreeBSD primary. The barrier seems to be less about software and more about hardware support, particularly around Wi-Fi drivers (which are at the top of the wish list for the Foundation to focus on in the coming year). A relatively high number of those who don't consider FreeBSD their main OS say they would consider doing so with hardware support for desktops and laptops that was equivalent to Linux.

The raw data for the survey is available as well.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (glibc and tomcat), Fedora (chromium, fcitx5-qt, python-pyqt6, qadwaitadecorations, qgnomeplatform, qt6, qt6-qt3d, qt6-qt5compat, qt6-qtbase, qt6-qtcharts, qt6-qtcoap, qt6-qtconnectivity, qt6-qtdatavis3d, qt6-qtdeclarative, qt6-qtgraphs, qt6-qtgrpc, qt6-qthttpserver, qt6-qtimageformats, qt6-qtlanguageserver, qt6-qtlocation, qt6-qtlottie, qt6-qtmqtt, qt6-qtmultimedia, qt6-qtnetworkauth, qt6-qtopcua, qt6-qtpositioning, qt6-qtquick3d, qt6-qtquick3dphysics, qt6-qtquicktimeline, qt6-qtremoteobjects, qt6-qtscxml, qt6-qtsensors, qt6-qtserialbus, qt6-qtserialport, qt6-qtshadertools, qt6-qtspeech, qt6-qtsvg, qt6-qttools, qt6-qttranslations, qt6-qtvirtualkeyboard, qt6-qtwayland, qt6-qtwebchannel, qt6-qtwebengine, qt6-qtwebsockets, qt6-qtwebview, and zeal), Red Hat (glibc, kernel, kernel-rt, kpatch-patch, linux-firmware, mod_http2, pcp, pcs, protobuf, python3, rpm-ostree, and rust), SUSE (git, glibc-livepatches, kernel, libxml2, openssl-1_1, SUSE Manager Client Tools, SUSE Manager Client Tools, salt, and xdg-desktop-portal), and Ubuntu (amavisd-new, firefox, flask-security, frr, git, intel-microcode, jinja2, libreoffice, linux-intel-iotg, unbound, and webkit2gtk).

The 6.9.2, 6.8.11, 6.6.32, 6.1.92, 5.15.160, 5.10.218, 5.4.277, and 4.19.315 stable kernel updates have all been released. Each contains an important set of fixes. Users of those kernels should upgrade.

With the release of Fedora 40 it's time to start looking ahead to what Fedora 41 has in store. One of the largest changes planned for the next release is a switch to DNF5, a C++ rewrite of the DNF package manager. A previous attempt to make the switch, during the Fedora 39 cycle, was called off, and deferred to Fedora 41. The developers have had nearly a year to address compatibility problems and bring DNF5 to a state suitable to replace DNF4. Signs point to a successful switch in the upcoming release, though there may be a few surprises lurking for Fedora users.

The KDE Project has announced the release of KDE Gear 24.05.0, with new features and updates for the more than 200 applications that are part of the project. In addition to new versions of the Dolphin file manager, Kdenlive video editor, and Elisa music player, this release includes five applications new to KDE Gear: the Audex CD-ripper application, an application Accessibility Inspector, the Francis Pomodoro timer, Kalm to teach breathing techniques, and a Sokoban-like game called Skladnik. See the full changelog for a complete list of changes.

KeePassXC is an open-source (GPLv3), cross-platform password manager with local-only data storage. The project comes with a number of build options that can be used to toggle optional features, such as browser integration and password database sharing. However, controversy ensued when Debian Developer Julian Klode decided to make use of these compile flags to disable these features to improve security in the keepassxc package uploaded to Debian unstable for the upcoming Debian 13 ("Trixie") release.

Version 3.20.0 of the Alpine Linux distribution has been released with initial support for 64-bit RISC-V. Other important changes include updates to GNOME 46, KDE Plasma 6, and replacing Redis with Valkey due to Redis's adoption of a non-free license model. See the release notes for more on this release.

Security updates have been issued by Debian (webkit2gtk), Fedora (kernel), Mageia (chromium-browser-stable, djvulibre, gdk-pixbuf2.0, nss & firefox, postgresql15 & postgresql13, python-pymongo, python-sqlparse, stb, thunderbird, and vim), Red Hat (go-toolset:rhel8, nodejs, and varnish:6), SUSE (gitui, glibc, and kernel), and Ubuntu (libspreadsheet-parseexcel-perl, linux-aws, linux-aws-5.15, linux-gke, linux-gcp, python-idna, and thunderbird).

The AlmaLinux project has announced the formation of the AlmaLinux Engineering Steering Committee (ALESCo):

[It] is dedicated to guiding the technical direction of the AlmaLinux distribution on a day-to-day basis within the guidelines set forth by the board, ensuring its robustness, reliability, sustainability, and relevance in the open-source ecosystem. ALESCo will work collaboratively with, and oversee relevant technical-focused Special Interest Groups (SIGs) to achieve these goals. It is "air traffic control" for engineering matters.

The initial members of ALESCo appointed by the AlmaLinux OS Foundation board are Andrew Lukoshko, Ben Thomas, Cody Robertson, Elkhan Mammadli, Jonathan Wright, and Neal Gompa. The AlmaLinux Wiki has more information on the committee's activities and how to get involved.

As the shiny new KDE Plasma 6 desktop makes its way into distribution releases, a small group of developers is still trying to preserve the KDE experience circa 2008. The Trinity Desktop Environment (TDE), is a continuation of KDE 3 that has maintained the old-school desktop with semi-regular releases since 2010. The most recent release, R14.1.2, was announced on April 28. TDE does deliver a usable retro desktop, but with some limitations that hamper its usability on modern systems.

Version 0.10 of the Vim-based text editor Neovim is now available. This release includes a new default color scheme, enhanced support for rendering multibyte characters, support for hyperlinks, system clipboard synchronization, and more. Many features have been deprecated in 0.10 and will be removed in future release. Neovim core contributor Gregory Anders has written a summary of some of the highlights and thoughts on upcoming releases:

We follow a "fun driven development" paradigm: for the most part, contributors and maintainers work on things that are personally interesting to them. Because of this, it can be difficult to predict what will happen in future releases. If there is a feature you want to see implemented, the best way to do it is to take a crack at it yourself: many of the features mentioned in this very blog post were contributed by users that are not part of the "core" maintenance team!

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (.NET 7.0, .NET 8.0, and nodejs:20), Debian (chromium, firefox-esr, ghostscript, and libreoffice), Fedora (djvulibre, mingw-glib2, mingw-python-jinja2, and mingw-python-werkzeug), Oracle (.NET 7.0, .NET 8.0, kernel, and nodejs:18), Red Hat (nodejs:20), Slackware (gdk and git), SUSE (python), and Ubuntu (linux-hwe-5.15, linux-raspi).

Security updates have been issued by Mageia (sssd and tcpdump), Red Hat (.NET 7.0, .NET 8.0, expat, kernel, and kernel-rt), Slackware (mozilla), SUSE (kernel, postgresql15, postgresql16, python-arcomplete, python-Fabric, python-PyGithub, python- antlr4-python3-runtime, python-avro, python-chardet, python-distro, python- docker, python-fakeredis, python-fixedint, pyth, and python3), and Ubuntu (linux-bluefield).

Version 24.0 of the Arch-based Manjaro distribution is now available with the 6.9 kernel, GNOME 46, Xfce 4.18, and an update to the Pamac package installer. This is also the project's first release with KDE Plasma 6:

The Plasma edition comes with the latest Plasma 6.0 series and KDE Gear 24.02. It brings exciting new improvements to your desktop.

With Plasma 6, KDE's technology stack has undergone major upgrades: a transition to the latest version of application framework, Qt, and an improved graphics platform when Wayland is used. These changes are as smooth and unnoticeable to the users as possible. You will see the same familiar desktop environment that you know and love. But these under-the-hood upgrades benefit Plasma's security, efficiency, and performance, and improve support for modern hardware. Thus Plasma delivers an overall more reliable user experience, while paving the way for many more improvements in the future.

The project also offers minimal install images with the 6.6 LTS and 6.1 LTS kernels to support older hardware.

Security updates have been issued by Debian (glib2.0 and shim), Fedora (glib2, gnome-shell, tcpdump, tpm2-tools, tpm2-tss, and uriparser), Mageia (mutt), Oracle (git-lfs, glibc, kernel, kernel-container, nodejs:18, nodejs:20, and pcp), SUSE (apache2, opensc, openssl-1_1, openssl-3, perl, python-Pillow, python-pyOpenSSL, python-Werkzeug, SUSE Manager Client Tools Beta, tpm2-0-tss, and tpm2.0-tools), and Ubuntu (sqlparse and strongswan).

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (nodejs:18 and shim), Debian (atril and chromium), Fedora (chromium, glib2, gnome-shell, mediawiki, php-wikimedia-cdb, php-wikimedia-utfnormal, stb, and tcpdump), Gentoo (Kubelet, PoDoFo, Rebar3, and thunderbird), Mageia (glibc and libnbd), Oracle (kernel), Red Hat (bind and dhcp and varnish), and SUSE (chromium, cpio, freerdp, giflib, gnutls, opera, python-Pillow, python-Werkzeug, tinyproxy, and tpm2-0-tss).

In April, the Gentoo Linux project banned the use of generative AI/ML tools due to copyright, ethical, and quality concerns. This means contributors cannot use tools like ChatGPT or GitHub Copilot to create content for the distribution such as code, documentation, bug reports, and forum posts. A proposal for Debian to adopt a similar policy revealed a distinct lack of love for those kinds of tools, though it would also seem few contributors support banning them outright.