PostgreSQL Lands Batch Mode & Other Async I/O Improvements

([Free Software] 31 March 06:39 AM EDT Postgres AIO)

Last week PostgreSQL merged support for IO_uring that can provide for "considerably faster" performance of this popular open-source database server. Over the weekend some additional improvements were merged to the asynchronous I/O "AIO" code to PostgreSQL, including introducing a new batch mode that can also provide a performance win.

Linux 6.15 Wires Up SoundWire Bulk Register Access

([Multimedia] 31 March 06:17 AM EDT SoundWire BRA)

The in-development Linux 6.15 kernel is continuing to enhance its support for MIPI's SoundWire specification for small audio peripherals with this two-pin, low-complexity audio interface.

Many Rust Changes Submitted For Linux 6.15

([Programming] 30 March 08:06 PM EDT Rust For Linux 6.15)

All of the Rust programming language infrastructure updates for the Linux 6.15 kernel have now been submitted. In addition to a lot of technical Rust improvements for the Linux kernel, this cycle also marks the first time Rust Linux maintainer Miguel Ojeda has taken a pull request directly from another contributor as they prepare to work out sub-trees for the Rust ecosystem.

CachyOS Adds Limine Bootloader, Easier Samba Integration & NTSYNC Wine

([Operating Systems] 30 March 11:43 AM EDT CachyOS March 2025)

The Arch Linux powered CachyOS is out with its March 2025 update that delivers a number of new features for this OS that is popular with open-source enthusiasts and power users for its out-of-the-box performance optimizations and extensive tuning.

Chromium Web Browser Lands Support For Wayland XDG-Session-Management

([Google] 30 March 11:07 AM EDT Chrome + xdg-session-management)

Google's Ozone Wayland support continues to improve for benefiting the Chrome/Chromium web browser. The newest addition merged this past week is support for the xdg-session-management protocol.

Lenovo ThinkEdge SE30 Watchdog Driver Coming For Linux 6.15

([Hardware] 30 March 09:17 AM EDT Lenovo SE30 Watchdog)

The watchdog subsystem changes have been submitted for the Linux 6.15 merge window that is now at the mid-way point.

IO_uring Network Zero-Copy Receive Lands In Linux 6.15

([Linux Kernel] 30 March 09:33 AM EDT IO_uring Network Zero-Copy Rx)

IO_uring continues maturing while being one of the greatest innovations within the Linux kernel in the past number of years. With Linux 6.15, IO_uring is getting even more interesting with introducing network zero-copy receive support. With this new code a 200G link could be saturated off a single CPU core in a recent demonstration.

Mesa's Exciting Q1 With More Ray-Tracing, NVK Progress & Performance Optimizations

([Mesa] 30 March 06:51 AM EDT Mesa Q1-2025 Highlights)

The first quarter of 2025 is already drawing to a close... It seemed like Q1'2025 flew by but when looking back at all the Mesa 3D graphics driver activity, there was a heck of a lot accomplished in this area of the open-source landscape. Open-source Vulkan drivers continued advancing feverishly, Mesa code continues to be adapted to new platforms from Windows to Haiku OS, and all the big vendors continue being involved in open-source GPU drivers in one form or another.

MIPS Lands Multi-Cluster Support In Linux 6.15 For The EyeQ6 SoC

([Linux Kernel] 30 March 06:30 AM EDT MIPS)

While the upstream MIPS architecture is at a dead-end due to RISC-V, the Linux kernel code for the MIPS CPU architecture continues to improve for all the existing MIPS-based platforms out there. With Linux 6.15 there is new work for enhancing the Mobileye EyeQ6 SoC support.

Shotcut 25.03 Open-Source, Cross-Platform Video Editor Released

([Multimedia] 29 March 08:44 PM EDT Shotcut 25.03)

Shotcut 25.03 is now available for this open-source and cross-platform video editor built atop the MLT Multimedia Framework.

Intel's 2025-Q1 Linux Excitement With Battlemage, AVX10 & Other Kernel Improvements

([Intel] 29 March 11:30 AM EDT Intel Linux 2025-Q1 Recap)

With the first quarter quickly drawing to a close, here's a look back at the most popular Intel Linux news of the quarter. There's been excitement with the Battlemage discrete graphics cards with their open-source driver, early work on Xe3 graphics, AVX10.2 dropping the optional 512-bit features to make it mandatory now (thankfully!), and a lot of exciting upstream Linux kernel improvements.

Firmware Loader Makes It Possible To Use Old Samsung TV Cameras On Linux

([Hardware] 29 March 09:39 AM EDT Samsung TV Cameras)

Samsung used to sell web cameras for their smart TVs for use with living room video chatting with the likes of Skype. Samsung no longer supports Skype on their TVs (goodbye Skype!) or these devices but if you happen to have one laying around or buy one used for cheap, it's now possible to use these Samsung TV cameras as a standard web camera under Linux.

Linux 6.15 PCI Brings New Drivers For Agilex PCIe Controller & AMD Multimedia DMA Bridge

([Hardware] 29 March 09:14 AM EDT Linux 6.15 PCI)

All of the PCI subsystem feature updates have now been merged for the Linux 6.15 kernel cycle. This includes some new drivers from AMD and Intel-Altera as well as various other PCI changes.

Xiph.Org's Theora libtheora 1.2 Officially Released: 16 Years After v1.0

([Multimedia] 29 March 06:52 AM EDT libtheora 1.2)

Earlier this month brought the Theora 1.2 beta release coming 16 years after Theora's libtheora 1.0 release for this video codec designed by Xiph.Org for use with Ogg audio. Theora is derived from the now rather ancient VP3 video codec, but for those continuing to enjoy content in Theora format, today brings the version 1.2 library.

KDE Plasma 6.3.4 To Fix The "Most Common" Crash, Other Crash Fixes Coming Too

([KDE] 29 March 06:35 AM EDT KDE This Week)

Within This Week in Plasma, KDE developer Nate Graham notes the great excitement in KDE bug fixing this week/ KDE developers have lowered their HI/VHI priority bug counts down to "their lowest numbers ever numbers" in addition to working on new Plasma 6.4 features over the past few days.

Debian 13 "Trixie" Freeze Process Begins

([Debian] 29 March 06:16 AM EDT Debian 13)

The Debian release team announced that the Debian 13 "Trixie" transition and toolchain freeze began on-schedule this month.

Torvalds Frustrated Over "Disgusting" Testing "Turd" DRM Code Landing In Linux 6.15

([Linux Kernel] 29 March 12:00 AM EDT hdrtest)

The big set of open-source graphics driver updates for Linux 6.15 have been merged but Linux creator Linus Torvalds isn't particularly happy with the pull request. In particular, he's unhappy with some new "hdrtest" testing code being built as part of full kernel builds and the "turds" it leaves behind and this code "needs to die" at least from the perspective of non-DRM driver developers.

GNOME Builder IDE Adds Arduino Integration, New Remote Desktop Software For VMs

([GNOME] 28 March 08:38 PM EDT GNOME Improvements)

While fresh off the GNOME 48 release, GNOME desktop developers aren't slowing down and there's been some interesting activity to report this week.

Linux 6.15 Graphics Drivers: NOVA Core, Apple Touch Bar, Lots For AMD + Intel GPUs

([Linux Kernel] 28 March 02:43 PM EDT Linux 6.15 DRM)

The big pull request was sent out today of the numerous Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) updates for the in-development Linux 6.15 kernel. There are new drivers, a lot as usual for the AMD Radeon and Intel kernel graphics drivers, and a lot of other changes throughout for advancing these open-source kernel graphics/display drivers.

GNOME 48 & KDE Plasma 6.3 Delivering Great Wayland Desktop Experience On Ubuntu 25.04 For Linux Gaming

([Linux Gaming] 28 March 11:42 AM EDT 80 Comments)

While there were a few graphics benchmarks in yesterday's Ubuntu 25.04 beta benchmarks, today's article is looking more at the Ubuntu 25.04 Linux gaming performance for both the GNOME 48 and KDE Plasma 6.3 desktops that default to the Wayland-based session by default while also trying out the X11 session for both of these desktops.