Linux

A new patch series from an NXP engineer optimizes the secure erase performance for certain Kingston eMMC devices. Currently with the Linux kernel performing a secure erase on 1GB of data can take around ten minutes. With these new patches that 1GB secure erase can be done in around two seconds.

Some Kingston eMMC devices will consume a fixed two seconds per secure erase operation regardless of the erase size. When the Linux kernel is currently performing a secure erase it is limited by the max discard size and thus will issue around 300 operations to erase 1GB. Today's patches from NXP engineer Luke Wang will drop that secure erase process into a single command and thus consuming just around two seconds of time.

All of the PCI subsystem updates were merged last week for the nearly-over Linux 6.19 merge window. Standing out this cycle are Resizable BAR improvements as well as introducing a few new PCIe controller drivers.

The PCI pull for Linux 6.19 brought Resizable BAR (ReBAR) improvements. Among the Resizable BAR improvements were for preventing resource tree corruption when BAR resize fails and restoring BARs to the original size of a BAR resize fail. There are also changes for the Intel Xe and i915 drivers as well as AMDGPU driver so that PCI core can properly restore BARs if the resize fails.

Compare with 2024: https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2024/technology#1-operating-system

So, I installed Linux Mint not too long ago, and while I've been able to do what I want to do without touching the Terminal, I am a bit curious how it works, and whether it could help me.

In particular, I am slowly getting into programming, and I've heard some people talk about strange, otherworldly things, like Vim, and Shell Scripts.

There was this PDF I downloaded called "The Linux Command Line" by William Shotts, but it is 570 pages long, and glancing through it, it seems to go into many different things, and I am afraid I'll end up learning a hundred things while only ever using ten of them, if you get my meaning.

So yeah, anyone who has some tips, or resources for a Linux newbie, please let me know.

NetworkManager, a system service and set of tools for managing network connections, widely adopted by most Linux distributions, is rolling out version 1.54.3 today as the second maintenance update to the 1.54 series.

One change affects private connections that specify a user in the connection.permissions property. NetworkManager now verifies that the designated user actually has access to the 802.1X certificates and private keys configured for that connection.

This additional check prevents situations where a connection profile references credentials that the intended user cannot read, reducing the risk of misconfigurations and unexpected connection failures, especially in multi-user or enterprise setups.

Kali Linux 2025.3, a Debian-based distribution designed for advanced penetration testing and security auditing, is now available for download, marking the fourth quarterly release of 2025.

All supported desktop environments have been updated. GNOME moves to version 49, bringing refreshed Kali theming and smoother visuals. Plus, the newer Showtime application has replaced the Totem video player, and the application grid now mirrors the menu structure, grouping Kali tools into folders.

A dedicated terminal shortcut using Ctrl+Alt+T or Win+T is now enabled by default. Most notably, GNOME in Kali no longer supports X11 sessions, making Wayland the sole display server.

Almost a month after the previous 6.20 release, KDE announced the launch of Frameworks 6.21, expanding its collection of add-on libraries to Qt and enhancing functionality available to developers across various platforms.

The update spans dozens of libraries that form the technical foundation of KDE software, including file handling, UI components, internationalization, build tooling, and system integration.

One of the most visible areas of change is KIO, which receives a long list of fixes and behavioral improvements. These include refinements to file previews, safer handling of systemd environment variables, improved rename dialogs, better progress reporting during file operations, and multiple crash and edge-case fixes. Several long-standing bugs related to trash handling, file links, and mount point resolution are also addressed.

https://system76.com/pop/download/

Release Notes

• Pop!_OS 24.04 LTS includes the new COSMIC Desktop Environment, designed and developed by System76.

• Some GNOME apps are replaced by COSMIC apps

  • GNOME Files (Nautilus) > COSMIC Files
  • GNOME Terminal > COSMIC Terminal
  • GNOME Text Editor > COSMIC Text Editor
  • GNOME Media Player (Totem) > COSMIC Media Player

• Pop!_Shop is replaced by COSMIC Store

• Key components

  • COSMIC Epoch 1
  • Linux kernel 6.17.9
  • Mesa 25.1.5-1
  • NVIDIA Driver 580

• Some games may start partially off-screen. Press F11 or Super+F11 to fullscreen the game

• Display toggle hotkeys and an on-screen display is not supported yet

• COSMIC has a built-in screenshot tool. If you require annotations, we recommend Flameshot, which can be installed from Flathub via COSMIC Store. Version 13.1 or higher is required for COSMIC

• COSMIC is not currently optimized for touch devices. An on-screen-keyboard is in development.

• The COSMIC Desktop will be continuously updated with new features and improvements after release

• Kernels and hardware support are continuously updated in Pop!_OS

• You can follow COSMIC DE feature and improvement progress on the project board

With the NVIDIA 590 Linux driver series removing GeForce 900 series "Maxwell" and GeForce 10 series "Pascal" as part of punting it off to the latest legacy driver branch, it's time for a last look at how the mainline NVIDIA Linux driver is performing with these aging graphics cards relative to the current state of the upstream open-source NVIDIA Linux drivers. In this article is a look at how the open-source and upstream Nouveau kernel driver with Nouveau/NVK Mesa drivers are performing relative to the NVIDIA 580 series with its Maxwell and Pascal support. For further perspective is also tossing in newer graphics cards too for providing a end-of-year GeForce 980 / 1080 / 2080 / 3080 / 4080 / 5080 series comparison between these different Linux drivers

NVIDIA released today the NVIDIA 580.119.02 graphics drivers for NVIDIA GPUs on Linux, BSD, and Solaris systems as a new update in the latest NVIDIA 580 series.

NVIDIA 580.119.02 is here to fix a bug that caused display corruption on LG Ultragear monitors when using certain modes, a bug that caused corruption in the X-Plane video game on workstation NVIDIA GPUs, and a regression from NVIDIA 580.65.06 that caused mode timings like 1920×1080@75 to no longer be available.

This release also fixes a bug that caused the Dots Per Inch (DPI) to be incorrectly reported for some monitors, such as the Samsung Odyssey Neo G9, several problems that prevented Vulkan apps from working on the Venus VirtIO virtual GPU, and several EGL platform bugs that prevented multisample configurations from working.

The newest feature to land in the cross-platform Qt toolkit is QIORing as an abstraction for Linux's IO_uring interface. This QIORing may also end up supporting Microsoft's Windows IORing implementation as well.

QIORing is now merged to the Qt toolkit for abstracting IO_uring Linux usage from this Qt interface:

"Introduce QIORing to abstract io_uring on Linux

Somewhat low level code, intended as a low level abstraction.

The QIORing interface would also be used for Windows' IORing, developed at the same time as the io_uring version. There is some shared code and helper functions, but a lot of the code in some way touch the platform specifics, so without yet more abstractions quite some code is left as unique."

The code landed via this merge. The code had been worked on over the past several months by Mårten Nordheim.

Microsoft today released WSL 2.7.0, the newest version of their Windows Subsystem for Linux code that enables running Linux binaries atop Windows 11 hosts.

WIth WSL 2.7.0 they have re-based to using a downstream Linux kernel derived from Linux 6.6.114 LTS. WSL has been on the Linux 6.6 LTS branch for quite a while now and they remain there even with two newer Long Term Support kernels available (Linux 6.12 and Linux 6.18) but at least they have moved to a newer point release for incorporating the latest fixes and security updates.

A year after the previous 6.4 release, the Linux Mint development team has rolled out Cinnamon 6.6, with the desktop environment set to debut in the upcoming Linux Mint 22.3 “Zena” expected around Christmas.

The main menu receives the most visible set of changes. Its layout has been modernized with simplified navigation, cleaner category handling, optional avatars, and configurable places and bookmarks.

The big set of networking subsystem updates was recently merged for the ongoing Linux 6.19 merge window. There are some enticing core networking improvements like a big performance improvement for heavy transfer workloads, Bluetooth PAST enablement, and more. Plus a lot of wired and wireless networking driver activity and new hardware enablement.

KDE has released Gear 25.12, a holiday-season update that brings improvements across its applications and tools. Here’s what’s more important to note.

Itinerary receives one of the largest updates, adding more extractors for railway companies and events, along with automatic location detection for trip planning. The app now displays altitude during travel and includes a built-in currency converter, making it more useful on the move.

System tooling also sees progress. KJournald expands its capabilities by supporting loading user units in the log browser, giving users clearer insight into systemd activity without relying on command-line navigation.

While the Linux kernel has inclusive terminology guidelines for the past five years to replace phrases like master/slave and blacklist/whitelist, there has surprisingly been a "genocide" function within the kernel that was questioned when it was first submitted for inclusion but now removed in Linux 6.19.

Introduced to the Linux kernel back in 2023 was the d_genocide() function as part of various dcache updates to the kernel. The genocide name was questioned when the patches were first posted by longtime Linux developer Al Viro

Absolutely smashing their goals, the KDE team have managed to have a huge success for the 2025 fundraiser that's currently ongoing. 70% of KDE funding comes directly from users, so it's essential to help fund the free and open source software that you love.

The current total at time of writing has managed to hit a nice €272,256.5. Going by a blog post from developer Nate Graham, a whole lot of it came directly from the KDE Plasma pop-up that they added to remind people to support development

Tails has issued version 7.3.1 after discovering a security vulnerability in one of the software libraries bundled with the distribution during the final stages of preparing the planned 7.3 release.

So, instead of shipping with a known issue, the team restarted the entire release process to ensure the fix was included, resulting in this updated build. According to devs, the goal remains the same: keep the amnesic, privacy-focused system as secure and up to date as possible for users who rely on it for anonymous communication.

The update brings several refreshed components central to Tails’ security model. Tor Browser moves to version 15.0.3, delivering upstream privacy patches and stability improvements for browsing over the Tor network.

The topic of the Rust experiment was just discussed at the annual Maintainers Summit. The consensus among the assembled developers is that Rust in the kernel is no longer experimental — it is now a core part of the kernel and is here to stay. So the "experimental" tag will be coming off. Congratulations are in order for all of the Rust for Linux team.

Linux containers have made it reasonably easy to develop, distribute, and deploy server applications along with all the distribution dependencies that they need. For example, anyone can deploy and run a Debian-based PostgreSQL container on a Fedora Linux host. Distrobox is a project that is designed to bring the cross-distribution compatibility to the desktop and allow users to mix-and-match Linux distributions without fussing with dual-booting, virtual machines, or multiple computers. It is an ideal way to install additional software on image-based systems, such as Fedora's Atomic Desktops or Bazzite, and also provides a convenient way to move a development environment or favorite applications to a new system.

Distrobox creator Luca Di Maio was inspired by the Toolbx project (formerly Container Toolbox) for Fedora. Generally, the idea with Linux containers is to run processes in their own environment to isolate them as much as possible from the host without having to resort to virtual machines with their additional overhead. It is possible, though, to set up a container to give it privileged access to the system with little to no isolation. This is typically referred to as a privileged container. It is possible to set up privileged containers manually, but it requires the user to know a great deal about working with containers and some fairly involved setup. The original goal for Toolbx was to let users run a privileged container "toolbox" on image-based systems that could be used for system administration and troubleshooting without having to include administration utilities in the image itself.

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In mid-September, we reported that Nick Wellnhofer, the long-time maintainer of the widely used XML parsing library libxml2, planned to step down from the project. A few days ago, that change became official.

When looking at one of the latest commits in the project’s GitLab repository, you can now see the following notice:

“This project is unmaintained and has known security issues (https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/libxml2/-/issues/346). It is foolish to use this software to process untrusted data.”