Phoronix

The Linux kernel's frame-buffer device "FBDEV" subsystem has thankfully been on the decline over the past number of years thanks to the success of the more useful DRM/KMS drivers and having FBDEV compatibility emulation support. While not actively maintained, the FBDEV subsystem and some drivers remain within the Linux kernel and are used with some interest primarily in some legacy/embedded environments. The subsystem was orphaned while now a Linux kernel developer has stepped up to serve as its maintainer...

It's been over two years since Mumble 1.3 was released for this open-source VoIP / voice chat program that is popular with gamers and open-source enthusiasts while today it's been succeeded by Mumble 1.4...

Disclosed a few months back were "Trojan Source" attacks against compilers where specially crafted code could be rogue but not appear so due to exploiting Unicode issues. Unicode control characters could be used to reorder tokens in source code that could alter the behavior when compiled. With the upcoming GCC 12 compiler release there is a new warning to help point out possible Trojan Source attacks...

Sent in to the Linux kernel on Friday were the "char/misc" updates as the smorgasbord of kernel changes not fitting formally within other areas of the kernel. The char/misc changes range from AI accelerator driver updates to new Xilinx code to other random changes littered throughout...

Those wanting to enjoy some impressive Vulkan ray-traced visuals on Linux (and macOS or Windows) now have GravityMark to add to the list of Linux-native ray-traced software for testing...

Merged into Linux 5.17 this weekend is the Google-developed Page Table Check feature that can help combat some forms of memory corruption...

A new version of JACK2 is available this weekend, the latest version of this cross-platform, professional sound server...

Cemu as one of the leading Nintendo Wii U video game emulators is planning to go open-source this year and is also working on Linux support and related cross-platform advancements...

The Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) changes for Linux 5.17 bring several feature additions...

Intel ended out the week with a huge update to ISPC, the Intel Implicit SPMD Program Compiler. ISPC is Intel's LLVM-based compiler focused on its C variant with extensions for single program, multiple data (SPMD) programming. Interestingly with this release is the introduction of AMD Zen 1/2/3 targeting and even the PlayStation 5 while also adding support for forthcoming Intel Arc "Alchemist" (Xe HPG) hardware...

The sound subsystem updates have been merged into the Linux 5.17 kernel with a few notable hardware driver additions this cycle...

Libvirt 8.0 has been released for this open-source Virtualization API and associated daemon/tools for managing KVM, Xen, and other hypervisors...

The PCI subsystem updates for the in-development Linux 5.17 kernel have been submitted to Linus...

In addition to shipping Plasma 5.24 beta this week, KDE developers remained busy working on Plasma 5.24 as well as other KDE desktop components...

Wine 7.0 is inching towards release but for this week is the seventh weekly release candidate...

FFmpeg 5.0 is out today as a shiny feature update to this widely-used open-source audio/video handling suite...

Mesa's V3D and V3DV drivers providing open-source OpenGL and Vulkan driver support, respectively, for newer Broadcom VideoCore hardware now has a double buffer mode implemented. This is a win for numerous workloads for these drivers most notably used by modern Raspberry Pi single board computers...

The Qt Company just announced Qt 6.3 Alpha as the first formal test release for this next Qt6 toolkit update. The Qt Company also lifted the lid on their new Qt Quick Compiler where they are aiming for QML to run at "a speed close to native" for that interpreted language...

It turns out Ubuntu 22.04 LTS is planning to use the Linux 5.15 kernel as its default kernel. It makes sense in that Linux 5.15 is also a long-term support kernel, but unfortunate in that Ubuntu LTS releases haven't always used LTS kernel versions and v5.15 will be a half-year old already by the time the "Jammy Jellyfish" ships in April. This is a choice particularly unfortunate for those with recent hardware but at least there is the Ubuntu Mainline Kernel PPA and other non-default options available...

In addition to Intel's open-source Linux graphics driver developers being quite busy preparing for upcoming Intel Arc "Alchemist" (DG2) graphics cards on the consumer side, they have concurrently been preparing for Xe HP "Ponte Vecchio" hardware too. One of the big undertakings on that side from the driver perspective is bringing up multiple tiles...