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Links 16/7/2017: Mesa 17.1.5, FreeBSD 11.1 RC3





GNOME bluefish

Contents





GNU/Linux



  • How I put Linux in the enterprise
    I used to work in higher ed. In the late 1990s, we moved to a new student records system. We created an "add-on" web registration system, so students could register on-line—still a new idea in 1998. But when we finally went live, the load crushed the web servers. No one could register. We tried to fix it, but nothing worked.


  • Desktop





  • Kernel Space



    • Linux 4.12.2
      I'm announcing the release of the 4.12.2 kernel.

      All users of the 4.12 kernel series must upgrade.

      The updated 4.12.y git tree can be found at: git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-stable.git linux-4.12.y and can be browsed at the normal kernel.org git web browser: http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-st...


    • Linux 4.11.11
    • Linux 4.9.38
    • Linux 4.4.77
    • Linux 3.18.61


    • UBIFS Gets Statx Support, Better Encryption In Linux 4.13
      The Linux 4.13 kernel changes for the UBIFS file-system have been submitted.

      UBIFS, as a reminder, is the Unsorted Block Image File-System deigned for flash memory devices off the UBI layer. UBIFS in Linux 4.10 gained file-encryption support making use of the fscrypt functionality used as well by F2FS and EXT4. With Linux 4.13, there are UBIFS related encryption updates and fixes.


    • Linux 4.13 Thermal Management Sees Some Improvements For CPU_Cooling
      The thermal management updates have landed in the Linux 4.13 code-base.


    • Linux 4.13-rc1 Kernel Released


    • Merge window over - Linux 4.13-rc1 out
      Ok, normally I do this on Sunday afternoon, but occasionally it happens a day early like now to avoid people timing me.

      In fact, I was planning on doing it yesterday evening this time around because I was so annoyed with lots of late pull requests on Friday (and some today), but ended up going to dinner and not getting everything done, so it's only one day early. Next time...


    • The New Changes & Features Of The Linux 4.13 Kernel
      With Linux 4.13-rc1 having been released, here's my original look at the new features coming for the Linux 4.13 kernel and the other changes merged over the past two weeks of this new cycle.



    • Please pull NFS client changes for Linux 4.13


    • Graphics Stack



      • Mesa 17.1.5 Brings More Fixes To Open-Source GPU Driver Users
        Andres Gomez of Igalia has announced Mesa 17.1.5 as the newest point release to the current Mesa 3D stable series.

        Mesa 17.1.5 fixes a potential crash in core Mesa, has Vulkan / SPIR-V fixes, the usual notable fixes in the Intel i965 and RadeonSI drivers, and some smaller fixes to Etnaviv, OpenSWR, SVGA, and other parts of this massive user-space 3D graphics stack.


      • [Mesa-announce] [ANNOUNCE] mesa 17.1.5
        In Mesa Core we include a fix to prevent a potential crash.


      • Mesa 17.1.5 Linux Graphics Stack Released, Improves AMD Radeon & Intel Drivers
        After teasing us a couple of days ago with the upcoming availability of the fifth maintenance update to the Mesa 17.1 3D Graphics Stack for GNU/Linux distributions, Mesa developer Andres Gomez is now announcing the final release of Mesa 17.1.5.

        Mesa 17.1.5 comes only two weeks after the Mesa 17.1.4 update that probably many of you are using right now on your Linux distros, and it's here to add an extra layer of improvements for those using AMD Radeon or Intel graphics cards. First off, Mesa 17.1.5 fixes a potential crash in Mesa Core, adds better support for the GLSL and SPIR-V compilers, and solves a linking problem with standalone Android builds.


      • Vulkan 1.0.54 Lands In Mesa For Intel ANV, Some RADV Extensions
        It's fabulous to see how promptly the Mesa Vulkan drivers are receiving support for new extensions.

        Vulkan 1.0.54 was released on Thursday. This updated promoted the external memory and semaphores extensions from experimental to stable. They also added new extensions for 16-bit storage, dedicated allocation, storage buffer storage class, variable pointers, new memory requirements query, and external fences for external memory.


      • Difficulties and Success Stories
        This hints to a fundamental issue with our approach of using the Present extension in Xwayland. The extension was written with hardware in mind. It assumes a flip happens directly on a screen. There is no intermediate link like a Wayland compositor and if a flip has happened the old buffer is not on the screen anymore. Why do we still try to leverage the Present extension support in Xwayland then? There are two important features of a Wayland compositor we want to have with Xwayland: A tear-free experience for the user and the ability to output a buffer rendered by a direct rendering client on a hardware plane without any copies in between. Every frame is perfect should also remain valid when using some legacy application and that we want no unnecessary copies is simply a question of performance improvements. This is especially important for many of the more demanding games out there, which won’t be Wayland native in the short term and some of them maybe never. Both features need the the full Present extension support in the Xwayland DDX. Without it a direct rendering application would still use the Present extension but only with its fallback code path of copying the Pixmap’s content. And for a tear-free experience we would at least need to sync these copies to the frame events sent by the Wayland compositor or better directly allow multiple buffers, otherwise we would limit our frame rate. In both cases this means again to increase the Present extension support.


      • It Looks Like Intel Could Begin Pushing Graphics Tech More Seriously
        It's been a while now since last seeing some major graphics advancements on Intel CPUs. With Skylake/Kabylake we are on "Gen 9" graphics, Kabylake-Refresh / Coffeelake is still Gen9 graphics, Broadwell was on Gen8, Haswell on Gen7.5, and IvyBridge on Gen 7. But with upcoming launches past Kabylake-Refresh/Coffeelake, it looks like we'll be stamping out Gen 10, Gen 11, and Gen 12.


      • Codeplay Release “clspv”, an OpenCL Tool for Vulkan Enabled Devices
        In collaboration with Google, Codeplay is proud to announce the release of a new open-source tool allowing the compilation of OpenCL C language kernels to run on the Vulkan API.






  • Applications



  • Desktop Environments/WMs



    • K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt



      • digiKam GSoC Students in Egypt


        It was nice meeting Ahmed and Shaza @ faculty of Engineering, Ain Shams University in Cairo. I am proud to mentor them in Google Summer of Code.

        Ahmed is working on implementing a DLNA server in digiKam core to export photo and video hosted in physical and virtual collections. The server is ready and he working on the configuration panel UI. See more here.



      • Best be precise
        KSysGuard — the system monitor — on FreeBSD seems oddly precise.


      • Plasma Wayland and Qt 5.9 and beyond
        As you might know Qt 5.8 created challenging problems for our Wayland session and threw our efforts back quite a bit. In this post I want to discuss the actual problems it created, how we are addressing them and looking into the future.


      • The Regressed State Of KDE Plasma On Wayland, But Things Should Get Better
        KWin maintainer Martin Gräßlin has written a blog post explaining the issues they've run into with KDE Plasma on Wayland and how changes to Qt have set them back months in their Wayland session support.


      • Akademy Schedule
        The workshops and lightning talks and BoFs are being planned, too. I’m glad Anu Mittal has mentioned her QML + JS workshop, it’s a great topic for getting started with application development. QML is something I’ve never gotten in to, but should, so I’ve penciled this workshop into my schedule as well.


      • [Krita] GSoC’17-Week #4


      • KF5 Applications Porting


        Next week, KDE developers will release the beta of KDE Applications 17.08. This release will again have more applications and nearly all games ported to Qt5/KF5. While Qt4 is already no longer supported for over a year, KDE has decided to support Qt4/kdelibs4-based applications a bit longer.

        The 17.08 release, however, will be the last to include Qt4/kdelibs4-based applications. This means, 17.12 will only include applications that are based on Qt5/KF5. See this mailing list discussion.


      • Kdenlive 17.04.3 released
        In comparison to previous versions this was the least exciting development cycle, in terms of new features, since all focus has been on the code refactoring which will bring more stability and new features. Don’t miss the next Café to keep track on the progress and share your thoughts if you like.






  • Distributions



    • Reviews



      • Solus 2017.04.18.0 review - Second time lucky?
        Solus 2017 looks like a nice distro, with some obvious visual caveats and tiny functional quirks. It's reasonable enough than I'm determined to test it on non-UEFI hardware, where I'll hopefully have more luck. But on a UEFI platform, it seems hopeless. I don't know there should be a problem when so many other distros do just fine without any issues. Solus seems to be a special snowflake, and it does not cooperate well with a modern and complex system.

        All in all, I cannot recommend the distro, because the outcome may still be harmful. If a distro cannot install properly, the results can be unpredictable. My testing shows some very favorable things, and Budgie looks quite all right now, but as a package, Solus just doesn't handle UEFI well. I'll report back after a third, and hopefully lucky test, but you are warned to carefully proceed until the hardware side has been polished. Double sigh. Maybe another another time.


      • A Short Review of Linux Mint 18.2 "Sonya" Cinnamon LTS




    • New Releases



      • Introducing Endless OS 3.2
        This major release brings some exciting changes with a refreshed desktop, great visual improvements, and more offline apps for our users in Southeast Asia to enjoy. Since this is a major release, make sure to update your OS (Settings > Details > Check for updates now), before you update your apps from the App Center!




    • Red Hat Family



    • Debian Family





  • Devices/Embedded





Free Software/Open Source



  • Web Browsers



    • Mozilla



      • Pale Moon browser new release, better media support


        I have updated my palemoon.SlackBuild and have uploaded fresh Slackware packages for this new Pale Moon 27.4.0. As previously shared with you, I diverge from the official developers’ recommendations about how to compile this browser on Linux. For instance the gcc compiler I used on Slackware 14.2 is gcc-5.3.0 (which is part of this distro release). On -current I failed compiling with the gcc-7.1.0 compiler which is the default there and I had to create a “gcc5” package for gcc-5.4.0 (which was an earlier gcc version in slackware-current). I wrote an article on this very blog about that gcc5 package if you are interested, it can be installed in parallel with Slackware’s own gcc-7. There are some other differences, mainly in the way I optimize my build.






  • Oracle/Java/LibreOffice



    • LibreOffice 5.3.4 Released and Available via PPA for Ubuntu/Linux Mint
      LibreOffice is the power-packed free, libre and open source personal productivity suite for Windows, Macintosh and GNU/Linux, that gives you six feature-rich applications for all your document production and data processing needs: Writer, the word processor, Calc, the spreadsheet application, Impress, the presentation engine, Draw, our drawing and flowcharting application, Base, our database and database frontend, and Math for editing mathematics. Its clean interface and powerful tools let you unleash your creativity and grow your productivity. Support and documentation is free from our large, dedicated community of users, contributors and developers.




  • BSD



    • NAS4Free 11.1.0.4.4485 Released


    • FreeBSD 11.1-RC3 Available
      The third RC build for the FreeBSD 11.1 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, armv6, i386, aarch64, powerpc, powerpc64 and sparc64 architectures are available on most of our FreeBSD mirror sites.


    • FreeBSD 11.1-RC3 Now Available
      The third RC build of the 11.1-RELEASE release cycle is now available. This is expected to be the final RC build of the 11.1-RELEASE cycle.


    • FreeBSD 11.1 RC3 Released As The Final Build Is Near
      FreeBSD 11.1 remains on track for releasing later this month.

      FreeBSD 11.1 RC3 is available this weekend as what should be the final release candidate for this minor update to FreeBSD 11. Changes found in FreeBSD 11.1 RC3 include adding deprecation notices to gdb/kgdb/sicontrol/wlconfig and other drivers that will be removed in FreeBSD 12.0, Capsicum support in the Bhyve virtualization code, and various other fixes and clean-ups.




  • Licensing/Legal



    • EUPL v1.2 becomes OSI approved

      "The OSI has approved EUPL v1.2. It will be added to the public list of OSI-approved licenses in due course. As with EUPL 1.1, the approval extends to all the official language versions of the license."





Leftovers



Recent Techrights' Posts

The 'Culture Wars' in Free Software Have Gone Out of Control
Social control media amplifies such utterly infantile discourse
10 Out of 10: RMS Attracts Massive Audience in Göteborg, Sweden (All Seats Occupied, Some People Standing)
a 55-second clip of his talk
The Lawsuit by Clients of Brett Wilson LLP Against Brett Wilson LLP is Officially On, It is Progressing, The 'Experts' Pick Outside Law Firms (RPC and Mills & Reeve) to Spare Them From Litigants in Person
So it is probably quite potent
Slopwatch: Plagiarism and "Linux" Articles by Bots
Sites that do this won't survive; many of them rely on slop services (suppliers) that will cease to exist after the bubble bursts
 
Peter O'Callaghan QC represented grandparents, Westernport Hotel, at Liquor Royal Commission
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Either The Register MS Divests From FOSS Coverage or Liam Proven is on Long Holiday
Publishers perish when their audience loses trust in them
Microsoft Cancelling Another Datacentre is a Sign of Financial Trouble and Lack of Growth
The debt continues to grow
Gemini Links 11/10/2025: An Evening at the Fair and Fast Fourier Friday
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, October 10, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, October 10, 2025
Geminispace is Very Large
The word continues to spread and the number of participants grows
Teaser: To Compensate for the Fact Our Clients Are Terrible Human Beings Who Strangle Women (While on Microsoft's Payroll) and We Get Paid by Mystery Parties We Bombard You and Your Wife With Almost 10 Kilograms of Legal Papers
If you can't win an argument, then drown the other side with papers?
Another Wave of Microsoft Layoffs, This Time During National Day Holiday
This time it's China again
Staying Happy in Times of Crackdowns on Civil Society
Optimism in this sort of "new reality" or "new normal" seems like something for the irrational person
"Nobel" Exploited Posthumously for "AI" Hype, Now They Do the Same With "Quantum"
ere have been many jokes about "Nobel" for peace (often granted to pro-war people) and a fake one for "Economics" (establishment propaganda)
Distinguished Lecture by Richard Stallman This Coming Monday in Rome
After "Free software, Crucial for Freedom in a Digital World"
Links 10/10/2025: Putin Admits Russia Downed Azerbaijan Airlines Jet, More New Heat Records
Links for the day
Noteworthy Claim That IBM is Firing a Lot of Lawyers This Week (RAs in the Legal Department)
A lot of what they do is patent 'trolling' or lawyering up against their own staff (e.g. HR disputes)
Links 10/10/2025: US Judge Bars Attacks by ICE On Journalists and Protesters; “We Took The Freedom of Speech Away” Says the President
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Serial Sloppers, Google News Gifting Slopfarms, and Fake News/Plagiarism About "Linux"
Google itself is a slop pusher these days
Qualcomm, the New Owner of Arduino, Blasted for Its Software Patents Tax on 'Smartphones'
A lot of Qualcomm's patents are on software. We wrote about this in prior years.
XBox Layoffs Rumours, Downtime, and Criticism From XBox Co-Founder
"everyone is ditching the xbox."
Links 10/10/2025: Honoring The Legacy Of Robert Murray-Smith, Many Articles on the Hey Hi (AI) Bubble
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: October Gothic and Reading Middle Earth Role Playing; C and Ada
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 09, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 09, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Farewell to Jane Goodall, California Bans Algorithmic Price-Fixing
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Lost Wages and a Saga Of Continuing To Use Palm PDAs
Links for the day
Richard Stallman's Talk in Helsinki is Done. Tomorrow Göteborg.
There are scarce details in Finnish about Dr. Stallman's talk
New XBox Leaks Probably Serve to Confirm XBox's Collapse (Many More Layoffs)
It's very much consistent with what many other sites have reported lately
The Slop Song
The train wreck marches on
LLM Slop/Advanced Plagiarism Flooding the Zone With Capital That Does Not Exist
Many publishers out there still participate in this bubble instead of calling it what it is
Links 09/10/2025: Sacked Microsoft Workers Make "Sackbird", IBM Taps CockroachDB for PostgreSQL
Links for the day
"Happy Hacking Day" Richard Stallman Talk This Afternoon (From 14:00 to 16:00) at Haaga-Helia University in Pasila
Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Finland
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 08, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Impact of Microsoft Layoffs, More Data Breaches
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Autumn Blues and C IRC Bot
Links for the day