KDE 5.20, New Linux laptops, and Snap auto-theming: Linux News Mid-October 2020
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Here are the latest Linux, open source, and privacy news for the first half of October 2020. This month, we have the release of KDE 5.20 and the Linux kernel 5.9, Snaps getting automatic theming, and yet more laptops running Linux out of the box !
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00:00 Introduction
01:17 Linux News
04:01 Open Source News
05:51 Gaming News
07:34 Hardware News
08:39 Applications News
Snaps have been criticized for not respecting the system's theme, but this might be improving pretty soon. Snapd will be able to monitor for theme changes, and will check if the associated theme is installed for your Snaps.
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2020/10/automatic-theme-installation-for-snap-apps-is-shaping-up-nicely-video
Nvidia released a new version of its Linux driver, 455.28. https://www.nvidia.com/download/driverResults.aspx/165689/en-us
What if MS used Linux as the base of the next version of Windows? I know, it's been discussed quite a lot lately, and I have reservations about this line of thinking, but this post, written by one of the founding fathers of the open source movement, Eric S. Raymond, is still interesting to read.
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=8764
The Linux kernel version 5.9 was released. It brings better memory management and a new memory controller. These improvements should lead to better kernel memory usage. Boot times should also be faster thanks to a new compression method for the kernel.
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2020/10/linux-5-9-kernel-featureske
Plasma 5.20 was released. It brings an icon only task manager by default, with grouping of windows, a revamped system tray presented as a grid of icons, the On-screen display elements that appear when you change the volume or brightness have been redesigned to look more elegant.
https://kde.org/announcements/plasma-5.20.0
Purism launched a mobile phone plan, called AweSIM, billed as made for privacy conscious users. At 99$ a month, it seems only available in the US, and will bring unlimited texts, talk, and data. https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2020/10/purism-librem-awesim
Purism, makers of the Librem 5 phone, are launching a campaign to let you bid on the apps you want to see ported to their mobile GNOME version called Phosh.
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2020/10/purism-fund-your-app-initiative
Debian announced a gaming focused event, called MiniDebConf Online #2: "Gaming Edition".
https://mdco2.mini.debconf.org
DXVK 1.7.2 is out, with fixes for D3D9, improved rendering on AMD drivers for some Unity games, and fixes for Baldur's Gate 3, Final Fantasy 14, Just Cause 3, Marvel's Avengers, or Need for Speed Heat.
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2020/10/d3d9-d3d10-and-d3d11-to-vulkan-translation-layer-dxvk-release-172-is-up
Wine 5.19 was released, with a new version of Wine Mono, supporting Windows Presentation Foundation text formatting, and 27 bug fixes.
https://www.winehq.org/announce/5.19
Feral announced that a Total War Troy port is still coming to Linux. They don't have any news to share as of yet, but that's to be expected, since the game is for now an Epic Games Store exclusive, and as such, not distributable for Linux.
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2020/10/looks-like-total-war-saga-troy-is-still-coming-to-linux-in-2021
Another news video, another Tuxedo laptop. These guys are really putting the pedal to the metal, and releasing another laptop running Linux: the Aura 15 meant for businesses.
https://www.tuxedocomputers.com/en/Linux-Hardware/Linux-Notebooks/15-16-inch/TUXEDO-Aura-15-Gen1.tuxedo
Another powerful laptop, with a redesigned website as well, the Kubuntu Focus 2 has been released. Like the first iteration, it has beefy specs, with up to an RTX 2080, 64Gb of RAM, 4Tb of SSD storage, and a 10th gen Core i7.
https://kfocus.org/
Krita 4.4.0 was released, with a bunch of new features. Fill layers are now multi threaded, so the app should have better performance, and the pattern of these layers can now be transformed and rotated.
https://krita.org/en/item/krita-4-4-0-released/
A super important app also has been released on Linux, and that's the Windows Calculator! Hem. Ok, no one really needed that, but it's interesting nonetheless.
https://ubuntu.com//blog/the-windows-calculator-on-linux-with-uno-platform
Pitivi the GTK video editor, has seen its 1.0 release at last! Well, the naming scheme has been changed, so it's version 2020.09.
https://blog.pitivi.org/2020/10/11/pitivi-2020-09-hocus-focus/
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