Ubuntu – Distro of the Week

Ubuntu 26.10 ‘Stonking Stingray’

While press reception may be lukewarm, Ubuntu’s latest version packs a punch

By Larry Cafiero

Like April, October is a busy month in the Linux universe, for no other reason than two of the top distros center their releases around these two months. April and October, like clockwork, both the Fedora Project and Ubuntu schedule semi-annual releases for the general public.

Distro of the Week will be taking a look at a release from the latter – Ubuntu 26.10, code named Stonking Stingray for those of you keeping score at home.

The Isle of Man-based distro makes a couple of improvements to its 2026 lineup, including the Linux 7.3 kernel and the Gnome 51 desktop environment. Also, Ubuntu introduces the Myna speech-to-text functionality, as well as improved security in the form of the adoption of Rust-based coreutils and expanded TPM-backed full encryption.

Ubuntu 26.10 now uses Rust implementations for its default core command-line utilities, as part of Canonical’s broader efforts to improve memory safety in fundamental system components without changing how users interact with familiar Linux commands.

Bear in mind that Ubuntu has also provided these various updates across its various desktop-based flavors, like Xubuntu (for Xfce users), Kubuntu (for KDE users – sensing a pattern here?), Lubuntu (for LXQt users), and so on.

Installing ‘Stonking Stingray’

First things first: The minimum system requirements to run Ubuntu seems to be fairly normal: The processor has to be 64-bit 2 GHz dual-core or better, the RAM has to be 6 GB or more – a hike up from the typical 4 GB required from most Linux distros – and a disk space of at least 25 GB free. A modern GPU is recommended for better performance, especially if the user is dealing with graphical applications, and an Internet connection is recommended for downloading updates and additional software during installation.

The software lineup in Ubuntu 26.10 is shown courtesy of the Gnome desktop.

That noted, we downloaded a somewhat large 6.2 GB ISO in what seemed like record time and put it on a USB stick. The live USB came up quickly with the standard Gnome-based Ubuntu desktop, with an option to install.

The Ubuntu Installer is a little more complex – albeit completely manageable – than the standard-issue Calamares installer common to most Linux distros. Whether that is good or bad is debatable, however the Ubuntu Installer brings the user through a labyrinth of questions, like accessibility issues (of which, to my knowledge, I have none) and what software the user would like to install (all of it, please), atop the relevant questions of language, keyboard, disk setup, and the like. There is a method to the madness, since Ubuntu wants to make sure that your install goes well, but there’s almost an element of overkill to this process.

Regardless, finally getting all our proverbial ducks in a row, the installation of Ubuntu 26.10 went off without a hitch, and roughly 15 minutes later we were both rocking and rolling with the new distro.

Kicking the tires on Ubuntu 26.10

The clean lines of the latest Gnome desktop environment greets the user, with a side panel of icons of the more common software programs used, while a small panel across the top provides a view of the desktop (or desktops) on the left, with the date and time in the center, followed by the WiFi, Volume, and Battery icons on the right. A home file is based on the bottom right of the screen, interestingly, and the software menu sits at the bottom of the left panel.

Speaking of software, Ubuntu 26.10 comes with a variety of software making it ready to use out of the box. The web browser is Firefox, accompanied by Thunderbird as the email client, with LibreOffice also front-and-center. It also includes Rhythmbox music player as well, along with a variety of Ubuntu-based tools.

The Sensors software in Ubuntu 26.10 provides users vital information on the hardware.

So after a short visit to the App Center to add a couple of software programs – like VLC media player to listen to tunes and the GNU Image Manipulation Program (otherwise known as GIMP) to edit photos – we were on our way.

Performance was not lacking in Ubuntu 26.10, and deserve special mention here. From the time we ran Software Updater after installing the distro, it was evident that there was much here to write home about. Whereas some Linux distros have a lag when calling up software, Stonking Stingray performed remarkably well across a wide range of hardware and programs came up almost immediately.

The Settings software in Ubuntu deserves special mention as well, where a wide variety of hardware options live. There is a vast range of benefits that await the user here, and fiddling with this was a personal favorite in this distro.

The Disk Use program in Ubuntu 26.10 is helpful in maintaining disk health.

But that facet aside, Ubuntu 26.10 performed adequately on the various daily tasks given to it: The web surfing on Firefox was simple and quick, the email using Thunderbird was equally up to its usual task, and listening to music, whether on the originally installed Rhythmbox or the post-install VLC media player, were both above adequate.

As you might expect, multitasking on Ubuntu 26.10 was beyond pleasant, with the RAM rarely reaching above 3 GB in use. The distro also performed well with web-based programs like Google Docs and Google Drive.

The final word

“Stonking” is a British slang term meaning of exceptional size or quality, often used to emphasize how good something is, like saying “a stonking good idea.” And a stingray is, well, a type of cartilaginous fish and has a flat, disk-shaped body, while living in coastal tropical and subtropical seas worldwide.

Listening to R.E.M. in VLC in Ubuntu 26.10 ‘Stonking Stingray.’

That said, the news world in the Linux universe seems to be lukewarm to this particular version of Ubuntu, with some even suggesting remaining with Resolute Raccoon for the moment.

That would be a big mistake.

While the latest advances may not be groundbreaking or earth-shattering, the improvements offered in Ubuntu 26.10 “Stonking Stingray” over its previous release provide users with what can best be described as the next step in the natural order of this particular distro, and a foundation for further improvements to come.

Like Linux Mint, Ubuntu long ago has cemented its reputation as the “gateway” to the Linux world for Windows refugees, and nothing has changed here. Essentially, beginners would have free rein to explore Linux in ultimately a safe environment here, and whatever minor changes Ubuntu brings with this latest release solidifies their status in this regard.

Intermediate and advanced users should be impressed with the security improvements to Ubuntu 26.10, despite preferring to tease new Ubuntu users about their proverbial “training wheels.” The fact of the matter is Stonking Stingray should get credit for bringing new users into the Linux fold, while its security updates are significantly above average.

Ubuntu 26.10 “Stonking Stingray” is definitely worth test-driving. Download the ISO at Ubuntu’s download page.

REMINDER: I’m giving a talk about Choosing a Distro at the Seattle GNU/Linux Conference on Friday, so there will be no Bits & Bobs compilation of Linux news on Saturday. Bits & Bobs will return a week from Saturday.

Do you have a distro you think would make a great feature for Distro of the Week? Don’t be shy—let me know! Email me at larry.cafiero@gmail.com and I’ll make an effort to make your choice available to the wider public … No suggestion is too mainstream!

Bits & Bobs: Happy Birthday, KDE

Compiled by Larry Cafiero

Marcus Nestor of 9 to 5 Linux, among other outlets, reported on Wednesday that KDE is celebrating its 30^th birthday while also releasing the KDE Plasma 6.8 desktop environment, moving it to a Wayland-only experience.

A little history: “On October 14th, 1996, Matthias Ettrich proposed a consistent, easy-to-use desktop environment for Unix-like systems,” the article says. “He called it the “Kool Desktop Environment” (KDE) — a deliberate jab at CDE, the proprietary Common Desktop Environment dominant at the time. What followed was 30 years of remarkable momentum.”

But wait, there’s more. “The first stable desktop environment, KDE 1 (One), shipped in 1998. Konqi, the beloved green dragon mascot, arrived in 1999 and eventually displaced Kandalf as the project’s mascot,” the article states. “By 2009, the community had landed one million commits to its codebase. The modern era brought KDE Plasma 5 in 2014, a full rearchitecting of the desktop built on Qt 5 and KDE Frameworks.”

For those of you keeping score at home, KDE’s current portfolio spans the Plasma Desktop, Plasma Mobile, KDE Gear, and KDE Frameworks. KDE counts more than 2,500 regular contributors, maintains software translated into over 108 languages, and sits atop more than six million lines of code.

“To celebrate KDE’s 30th anniversary, the KDE Plasma 6.8 desktop environment will be unveiled later today as a major milestone that moves to a Wayland-only experience and introduces numerous new features, including triple buffering for NVIDIA GPUs by default, enhanced multi-monitor support, Kup backup system integration, and much more,” the article says.

Happy 30th birthday, KDE.

Peppermint OS trying out Void?

Bobby Borisov on Linuxiac reported on Monday that Peppermint OS is setting its sights beyond Debian with Void Linux-based PepVoid, offering a new Void Linux-based edition featuring Xorg and Xlibre potentially coming in November.

“The initiative is very interesting because Void Linux takes a substantially different approach from Debian,” according to the article. “Unlike Debian’s fixed-release model, Void follows a rolling-release approach, allowing users to receive software updates continuously without waiting for major upgrades.”

Additionally, “Void uses the XBPS package manager instead of APT and is a systemd-free distro, betting on the runit init system rather than systemd. These differences give PepVoid a distinctly different technical foundation while, at the same time, retaining the familiar Peppermint philosophy,” the article says.

The Peppermint OS team is targeting November 2026 for a possible official PepVoid release, though the timeline depends on testing progress and will coincide with planned ISO refreshes for the project’s Debian-based editions.

Stonking Stingray now available

Hmmm, this looks like a good candidate for Distro of the Week . . .

Marcus Nestor on 9 to 5 Linux reported on Thursday that Ubuntu 26.10 – otherwise known as Stonking Stingray – is now available for download, and provides for a couple of improvements.

“Powered by the upcoming Linux 7.3 kernel series, Ubuntu 26.10 ships with the latest Gnome 51 desktop environment, TPM-backed full disk encryption (FDE) support on computers without a hardware root of trust, updated Settings to show whether a computer is certified for Ubuntu, and many accessibility improvements,” according to the article.

But wait, there’s more. “There are several App Center enhancements in Ubuntu 26.10, such as a unified app-details view for Snap and Debian packages, a dedicated Drivers page where you can review the available graphics drivers, including NVIDIA driver branches, and support for installing codecs for one-time playback when a media file uses a codec that’s not installed,” the article says.

The article also says that Ubuntu 26.10 also introduces the Myna speech-to-text dictation tool, but it’s not installed by default. With Myna, you would use locally installed AI models for dictation into the focused app by holding a configurable key. The transcription only runs locally, with no audio being sent to a cloud service.

“Under the hood, Ubuntu 26.10 comes with an updated toolchain that includes GCC 15.2, GNU C Library 2.44, GNU Binutils 2.47, systemd 261.3, Mesa 26.2, LLVM 22.1.8, Python 3.14.7, Rust 1.97.1, Go 1.27, OpenJDK 25.0.4, Zig 0.14.1, Zig 0.16, .NET 10.0.112, and others. Ubuntu 26.10 also switches to 100% Rust coreutils,” the article says.

Among other noteworthy changes, Ubuntu 26.10 improves rendering with fractionally scaled monitors, splits OpenSSH into two source packages on Ubuntu Server, removes support for legacy System V scripts, improves loading of desktop icons, and adds initial support for the SpacemiT K3 platform, along with RISC-V desktop images.

Gentoo looking for sponsors

Christine Hall at FOSS Force reported on Monday that after losing several long-running sponsors Gentoo is looking for infrastructure sponsors, specifically around hosting, hardware, rack space and, wait for it, cash.

“The Linux distribution Gentoo announced last week that it’s looking for some infrastructure sponsors,” the article says. “Like a large number of open source projects — and probably a majority of distros — Gentoo relies not only on volunteer developers to write and maintain code, it’s also dependent on community donations and sponsors to help cover expenses and meet infrastructure needs.”

The article continues: “The project, which announced in February that it was leaving Microsoft-owned GitHub for open source Codeberg, posted on Wednesday that this year several long-running sponsors were compelled to drop their support, so it’s looking for replacements. It appears the primary need is for infrastructure stuff such as rack space, servers in a data center, and server hardware, although cash donations are needed too.”

For potential sponsors, the project has set up an Infrastructure/Sponsorship wiki that includes a wish list of its needs:

EDITOR’S NOTE: Because I will be on the road most of next week, thanks to a speaking gig at the Seattle GNU/Linux Conference, there will be no Bits & Bobs column appearing next Saturday, Oct. 24. The Bits and Bobs column will return on the following Saturday.

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will skip a week but return with news over the week the following Saturday.

Bits & Bobs: ‘Forky’ artwork sought

Compiled by Larry Cafiero

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reported on Thursday that Debian 14 “Forky” artwork proposals are now open for submission, with the final release of Debian 14 operating system expected in mid-2027.

“This is the moment for aspiring artists and designers who want to display their work in front of millions of Debian users to submit their best artwork for the upcoming Debian 14 (codename Forky – continuing the “Toy Story” naming) operating system series, due for release in mid-2027,” the article says.

According to the article, “submissions are open until November 26th, 2026, but your artwork needs to meet some specifications, such as using an image format that can be later modified using free and open-source software, and adding a license that lets the Debian Project distribute your artwork within Debian.”

The artwork will not only be used for Debian Forky’s wallpaper, the article says, but also in various parts of the operating system, such as the boot screen, Debian Installer, login screen, CD/DVD labels, Debian Project’s website, and even stickers for laptops.

“The artwork is a key part of a Debian release because it’s usually the first thing new users see when installing or booting Debian, and it’s also the first thing that appears when Debian users share their screens or connect to an external device while giving talks around the world,” the article says.

Budgie, Cosmic updates for aerynOS

Bobby Borisov from Linuxiac reported on Friday that aerynOS will make Budgie 10.10.3 widely available on its distro, as well as announcing an update of Cosmic to 1.10

“Just days after its previous October update, aerynOS has rolled out another substantial refresh to its Unstable Stream. The headline change is Budgie 10.10.3 arriving in the distribution’s regular package repositories, alongside Cosmic Desktop 1.10, KDE Gear 26.08.2, and Linux kernel 7.2.9,” the article states.

What makes this noteworthy is that “Budgie 10.10.3 represents the desktop’s transition to a fully Wayland-based environment,” the article says. “Instead of relying on its previous X11 architecture, it now uses the lightweight labwc Wayland compositor with a configuration bridge that allows Budgie to manage the compositor’s settings.”

The aerynOS update upgrades COSMIC Desktop from 1.9 to 1.10. The new version includes bug fixes, improvements to drawing tablet support, and enhancements to GPU acceleration.

“KDE users also receive KDE Gear 26.08.2, the latest maintenance update for the 26.08 application series. Meanwhile, Gnome 51 gets several smaller application updates and packaging adjustments, including the addition of the Sushi file previewer to aerynOS’s recommended GNOME package set.

Gnome 52 scheduled for March 2027

Marcus Nestor on 9 to 5 Linux reported on Tuesday that Gnome 52 desktop environment is scheduled for release on St. Patrick’s day of next year.

The alpha of Gnome 52 alpha is expected on Jan. 9, 2027, with the beta scheduled to be released on Jan. 30. The release candidate for Gnome 52 is scheduled for Feb. 27.

The desktop enviroment is code-named “Terengganu” from the city where the Gnome Asia Summit 2026, “the annual Gnome conference in Asia, which will take place later this month, in Terengganu Digital 1303, Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia, from October 31st to November 2nd, 2026.”

Meanwhile, “let’s take a look at the release schedule for GNOME 52, as the alpha release is planned for January 9th, 2027, while the beta milestone is expected later that month, on January 30th, and, finally, the Release Candidate (RC) milestone is currently scheduled for February 27th, 2027,” the article said.

Ubuntu 26.10 gets GnuPG replacement

Sourav Rudra on It’s FOSS reported on Monday that Ubuntu 26.10 will have a Rust-based GnuPG replacement, with the Rust-based OpenPGP tool lands in Stonking Stingray’s main archive, with sq and sqv available alongside gpg and gpgv.

“You already know that Canonical has been selectively replacing Ubuntu’s C-based system components with Rust-written equivalents that don’t compromise in terms of functionality, most of the time,” the article says.

“Now it looks like the distro’s OpenPGP implementation is next, with Sequoia PGP coming preinstalled in Ubuntu 26.10,” the article continues. “Canonical wants it to eventually replace GnuPG as the default toolchain, though that switch has not happened yet.”

What is Sequoia PGP? Glad you asked.

Sequoia PGP was started in 2017 by former GnuPG developers who chose to build a new OpenPGP implementation in Rust.

“Sequoia PGP is designed as a library that other software can use directly, rather than a standalone command-line tool,” the article says. “sqsits on top of that for encryption, decryption, signing, and key management, and sqv handles signature verification, filling in for gpg and gpgv in GnuPG.”

But there’s a caveat. “The release notes for Ubuntu 26.10 and a recent announcement clearly mention that Sequoia PGP becoming Ubuntu’s default OpenPGP toolchain is a future goal, not something that’s already the default experience,” the article said.

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return with news over the week next Saturday.

Bits & Bobs: KDE Plasma ready to test

Compiled by Larry Cafiero

The KDE Plasma beat goes on . . .

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reports on Thursday that the KDE Plasma 6.8 desktop environment is ready for public beta testing, and a second beta will be available on Sept. 24.

“The KDE Project announced today the release of the beta version of the upcoming KDE Plasma 6.8 desktop environment series for public testing, a major update that introduces many new features and improvements,” the article states.

Some of the highlights of KDE Plasma 6.8 include triple buffering for NVIDIA GPUs enabled by default, support for recording audio in Spectacle during screen recording, and automatic logic support for Plasma Login Manager on distros with older systemd versions, such as KDE neon.

“KDE Plasma 6.8 also brings support for the Flatpak version of Microsoft Edge in Plasma Browser Integration, the ability to configure wireless access points to automatically select a channel in the Networks page in System Settings, and better detection of dark GTK 2 themes and applying a matching icon theme,” the article continues.

For users of multi-monitor setups, “KDE Plasma 6.8 will identify monitors with color-coded number badges in all the places they’re configured to make it easier to see which one is which, especially when you have two identical monitors, and faster adjustment of brightness on external monitors,” the article says.

“KDE Plasma 6.8 lets you set up wallpaper slideshows that don’t change automatically, displays notifications about connected devices that have low battery power in full-screen apps, and supports version 1.6 of the Emulated Input system for better integration of virtual keyboard, mouse, and touch input devices,” says the article.

Swiss abandoning Microsoft?

Abhishek Prakash of It’s Foss wrote an article on Monday that Switzerland’s federal government is replacing Microsoft on 3,000 of the country 54,000 federal government’s computers.

Why?

“According to Matthias Stürmer, professor at the Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH), Microsoft’s supremacy in public institutions poses three problems that are driving this migration,” the article states, and continues to explain.

“First is the risk of foreign access. US cloud legislation could expose Swiss government data to foreign authorities.

“Second is the risk to service continuity, as dependency on a single foreign vendor creates operational risk.

“The third risk is the escalating costs as proprietary licensing fees are rising with no Swiss leverage,” the article concludes.

According to the article, the “Federal Chancellery is investing CHF 9 million in an open-source workplace rollout for 3,000 federal employees. On September 3, 2026, the Federal Council published results of ‘PoC BOSS’, a feasibility proof-of-concept involving 172 federal employees who tested the openDesk suite, a German open-source collaboration platform.”

We’ll keep an eye on this one.

System76’s Cosmic DE gets an update

The Cosmic beat goes on . . .

Bobby Borisov of Linuxiac reported on Thursday that the Cosmic desktop environment from System76 makes several improvements in its latest iteration, Cosmic Desktop 1.8.

“System76 has released Cosmic Desktop 1.8 with a major update to the Cosmic compositor, cosmic-comp, adding touch input support that the developers say ‘vastly improves’ touchscreen support across Cosmic,” the article says. “Work is progressing on the on-screen keyboard, but it is not part of this release and is expected later.”

Other updates in Cosmic Desktop 1.8 also include an update to Smithay, improving mouse capture behavior. “X11 applications can now start minimized. Another fix targets sluggish Steam overlays by ensuring X11 windows continue receiving frame callbacks, resulting in smoother behavior when using Steam games and overlays under Cosmic,” the article says.

Hybrid GPU laptops are also receiving the attention of Cosmic developers as well. “COSMIC now checks all available connectors when determining the primary GPU, addressing problems affecting some systems with integrated and discrete graphics. The screenshot tool also received fixes for crashes related to window corner radii,” the article states.

MocaccinoOS makes improvements

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reported on Tuesday that MocaccinoOS has made improvments on its Gentoo-based distro as well, with MocaccinoOS 26.09 adding x86-64-v3 optimized builds for improved performance.

The latest version of the distro will also ship with the KDE Plasma, Gnome 49.7, Cosmic 1.7, Xfce 4.20 and MATE 1.26 desktop environments.

“Still powered by the long-term supported Linux 6.18 LTS kernel series, namely Linux 6.18.50, MocaccinoOS 26.09 improves Intel CPU/platform support, including for Raptor Lake systems, improves ASUS ROG/Armoury hardware support for asusctl, and adds optional x86-64-v3 optimized builds for improved performance on supported modern CPUs,” the article says.

As it stands now, “x86-64-v3 support is opt-in, which means that you will have to install it manually by running the sudo luet install layers/X-v3 command in your favorite terminal emulator, if your CPU supports it,” says the article. “It needs more testing, but after it’s solid and ready for the masses, it will become a selectable option in the Calamares installer.”

MocaccinoOS 26.09 also “updates the Cosmic edition to the latest Cosmic 1.7 desktop environment, as well as the Mesa graphics stack to version 26.2.1. The rest of the official flavors stay at the same desktop environment versions as in the MocaccinoOS 26.08 release, namely Gnome 49.7, Xfce 4.20, and MATE 1.28,” the article says.

Ubuntu 24.04.5 LTS now available

Another day, another milestone at Canonical . . .

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reported on Thursday that Ubuntu 24.04.5 LTS is now available for download, containing the Linux 7.0 kernel and Mesa 26.2 while continuing to receive software updates and security patches until June 2029.

“Coming six months after Ubuntu 24.04.4 LTS, the Ubuntu 24.04.5 LTS point release is here as an up-to-date installation medium, which includes all the latest software updates and security patches, for those who want to deploy the long-term supported Ubuntu 24.04 LTS (Noble Numbat) operating system on new computers without having to download hundreds of updated packages from the repositories after the installation,” the article states.

In its latest iteration, “Ubuntu 24.04.5 LTS is powered by Linux kernel 7.0 and the Mesa 26.2 graphics stack from the Ubuntu 26.04 LTS (Resolute Raccoon) release,” the article says. “While Ubuntu 24.04 and Ubuntu 24.04.1 shipped with Linux 6.8, Ubuntu 24.04.2 added Linux 6.11, Ubuntu 24.04.3 added Linux 6.14, and Ubuntu 24.04.4 added Linux 6.17, so Linux 7.0 should add an extra layer of hardware support.”

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return with news over the week next Saturday.

Bits & Bobs: Six best distro for kids

Compiled by Larry Cafiero

Linux Stans presented an interesting article on Thursday rating the six best Linux distro for kids today, which came up with some fascinating results.

Long gone are the days of Qimo 4 Kids, if you remember that distro. Qimo – pronounced “chemo,” as in the cancer treatment – “used to be one of the most recommended kids’ distros around, thanks to its cartoon-style interface and lightweight Xfce desktop,” according to the article.

However, Qimo for Kids officially shut down in January 2016, and its last release is based on Ubuntu 10.04.

Once again, the rankings are interesting and very sensible in a way. Are we going to give them to you here? No way. Read the article, because again it holds a lot of good information. Nice work, Linux Stans.

Stonking Stingray ready for testing

Marcus Nestor of 9 to 5 Linux reported on Thursday that Canonical had released Snapshot 3 of the upcoming Ubuntu 26.10 – code named Stonking Stingray – release as the third development milestone targeting early adopters and application developers who want to test their apps.

“Development of Ubuntu 26.10 (codename Stonking Stingray) kicked off on April 30th, 2026, with the usual toolchain upload, based on the Ubuntu 26.94 LTS (Resolute Raccoon) release, which means that it’s powered by Linux kernel 7.0 and uses the GNOME 50 desktop environment. In time, these will be updated to newer versions,” the article states.

Currently Ubuntu 26.10 Snapshot 3 is also using Linux kernel 7.0, just like the previous two Snapshots, but this one moved to Gnome 51 Beta. Canonical is still working on upgrading these stacks, which will probably happen closer to the beta release, while they work on new features and improvements.

“These include a complete desktop experience on RVA23-compliant hardware, improved driver management, improved multimedia support, a new, simplified installation experience, a new onboarding experience, on-device speech-to-text voice interaction, a package-agnostic App Center, and much more,” according to the article.

The final release of Ubuntu 26.10 is expected to be powered by the Linux 7.2 kernel series, which should be out in late August, along with the upcoming Mesa 26.2 graphics stack and the GNOME 51 desktop environment series, the article says.

FOSS Force interviews Stallman

Kudos to Christine Hall of FOSS Force for wrangling this interview with Free Software Movement founder Richard Stallman last week.

In a wide-ranging interview – and by “wide-ranging” we mean long, but interesting – Stallman discusses GNU, Linux, the open-source split, large language models, SaaS, digital surveillance, and why software freedom remains a moral issue.

“Richard Stallman needs no introduction, especially for an audience that reads FOSS Force,” the article begins. “Without him, the free software movement would at the very least be much different, and the four software freedoms would possibly still be waiting for someone to give voice to them. There would also be no GPL, the first general-purpose copyleft license, written long before there was such a thing as open source. Speaking of that, without Stallman there would also likely be no open source, although I’m pretty sure that he wouldn’t see that as such a bad thing.”

The article is in a Q-and-A format in which Hall asks important questions and gets relevant answers from Stallman. It is definitely worth a read.

CERN switches some systems to Debian

Michael Larabel of Phoronix reported on Wednesday that after being a long-time Red Hat institution, CERN is transitioning some of their systems to Debian.

“CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, besides being well known for its Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is known among longtime Linux users as a RHEL/CentOS shop,” the article starts. “CERN formally even co-maintained the Scientific Linux RHEL derivative with other educational/research institutions in the past. So to much surprise now, CERN is transitioning to Debian Linux for industrial accelerator-control computers.”

The article also states that CERN discussed this at a Debian conference in Switzerland this past weekend. Historically, CERN used their Red Hat-based Scientific Linux for about a decade before moving to CentOS in 2015.

“Now after a decade with CentOS, they are moving on and embracing Debian for a portion of their systems,” the article says.

But an update on the article cleared up CERN’s position, stating that “CERN has clarified that their focus with the migration is on their industrial accelerator-control computers while data centers and experimental computing remain on RHEL/AlmaLinux.”

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return with news over the week next Saturday.

Bits & Bobs: Cosmic 1.5 released

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reported on Wednesday that computer maker System76 released version 1.5 of the Cosmic desktop environment.

Based on Rust, the desktop environment’s improvements are generally based on performance issues.

“Coming only a week after Cosmic 1.4, the Cosmic 1.5 release is here to fix high CPU panel usage when the screen is locked, fix panel touch input, fix panel flickering when using the Frosted Glass effect when preserving style on window maximize, and fix Frosted Glass for panel applets on hotplugging an external monitor,” the article says.

Other specific improvements include a workaround to fix a Chromium issue when scaling, a fix for D-Bus deadlock, and a fix for an issue causing panic when rendering fails after a GPU reset, among other bugs in version 1.4.

“This release also brings some changes to COSMIC Settings with slider widget handle improvements, a fix for the one-pixel gap between outputs due to rounding errors, support for adding multiple images at once in the Wallpaper pane, which now supports up to 500 wallpapers, and networking improvements by no longer storing the VPN username as a secret,” the article says.

Check out the release notes on the project’s GitHub page for more details about the changes included in COSMIC 1.5.

Oops! Still GPL items in FreeBSD kernel

Christine Hall at FOSS Force reported on Wednesday that actually some of the GPL-based software in FreeBSD may still be lurking in some of the corners of that particular operating system’s kernel.

“A couple of weeks back we told you that the folks at FreeBSD had removed all GPL code from their operating system to keep the world safe for devs with copyleft allergies,” the article states. “The OS was thought to be GPL-free after the removal of dpv, a toolset that contains the GPL tool ‘dialog.’

That’s evidently important to BSD folks, who think that software freedom means the freedom to make it private.”

But . . .

“Unfortunately, the dev team at FreeBSD left some other GPL code behind, so the GPL still lurks, sprinkled in the FreeBSD kernel, of all places,” the article continues. “It’s in a header file that was copy and pasted from the Linux kernel for Qualcomm SoCs. There are also some GPLv2 snippets in the Device Tree.”

So it’s back to the drawing board for the FreeBSD developers. We’ll keep you updated on this as we find out more.

‘Stonking Stingray’ moving along

Sourav Rudra wrote an article in It’s FOSS on Wednesday about the improvements coming to the next Ubuntu version to be released in October.

“Every two years, Canonical puts out a Long Term Support release that gets five years of security updates, which can be stretched further with Ubuntu Pro,” the article states. “In between those LTS releases, Canonical ships an interim version every six months, and each one is supported for nine months.”

Those releases don’t carry the same importance as an LTS, but that’s the point, according to Rudra. They give Canonical room to test newer kernels, toolchains, and design changes with a smaller user base before those changes get baked into the next LTS.

“The next one, Ubuntu 26.10, carries the codename ‘Stonking Stingray’, continuing the tradition of ordered alphabetical codenames after Resolute Raccoon (26.04),” the article continues.

According to the article, “stonking” is British slang for something impressively big or excellent, and a stingray is the flat-bodied, boneless fish that spends most of its time half-buried in sand near the seafloor.

The article brings to the fore the schedule for the releases, with the next one being a Feature Freeze on Aug. 20, and the testing week takes place a week later on Aug. 27.

The article also states that “[i]f things go as planned, it will land on October 15, 2026, with a short support window that will close in July 2027.”

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return with news over the weekend on Monday.

Bits & Bobs: Debian 13 gets sixth update

By Larry Cafiero

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux on Saturday reported that the Debian Project announced the availability of Debian 13.6, as the sixth update of the Debian 13 Trixie operating system series.

“Coming less than two months after Debian 13.5, the Debian 13.6 release is here to provide users with updated ISOs for those who want to deploy the latest Debian 13 ‘Trixie’ operating system series on new hardware without downloading lots of updates after the installation or those who had issues with the previous ISO releases,” the article states.

Number-wise, the article states that the Debian 13.6 release includes a total of 124 bug fixes for miscellaneous packages and 120 security updates. Details about these security updates and miscellaneous bug fixes can be found on the release announcement page.

“Debian 13.6 installation images are available for download . . . for 64-bit (amd64), AArch64 (arm64), RISC-V 64-bit (riscv64), PowerPC 64-bit Little Endian (ppc64el), IBM System z (s390x), and ARMhf (armhf) hardware architectures,” the article says.

The article also says that existing Debian 13 “Trixie” users “should update their installations only by running the sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade commands in a terminal emulator or virtual console. Of course, you can also use a graphical package manager like Synaptic Package Manager to update your Debian system.”

Questing Quokka reaches end of life

Also from Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux is the news on Friday that Ubuntu 25.10 – more informally known as “Questing Quokka” – has reached the end of life on Friday, and his article urges those using Ubuntu 25.10 to upgrade to Ubuntu 26.04 at their earliest convenience.

“This is your friendly reminder that Ubuntu 25.10 ‘Questing Quokka’ reached the end of its supported life today, July 9th, 2026, and it is no longer supported by Canonical with software and security updates,” the article says.

According to the article, Ubuntu 25.10 was released on October 9th, 2025, “and, since it’s not an Ubuntu LTS (Long Term Support) release, it only received support for nine months, until July 2026.” As of July 9th, 2026, Canonical will no longer provide software and security updates to Ubuntu 25.10 systems, “which means that, in time, your installations will become vulnerable to all sorts of threats and attacks.”

Therefore, the article highly recommended that you upgrade to Ubuntu 26.04 LTS Resolute Raccoon, “which will receive software updates and security patches for five years or up to 10 years with a free Ubuntu Pro account,” the article concludes.

‘Frosted Glass’ comes to Cosmic DE

Michael Larabel at Phoronix on Friday reported that computer maker System76 has had their Pop_OS! developers create a “frosted glass” look for their Cosmic desktop environment, which is featured in the Pop_OS! System.

“System76 developers have for the past number of weeks been working on developing a ‘frosted glass’ appearance for the Cosmic desktop environment featured on their Pop!_OS Linux distribution,” the article states. “For Pop!_OS users this frosted glass feature is now available and will become more widespread for other Linux distributions once the next Cosmic release is formally tagged.”

According to the article, “System76 CEO Carl Richell shared today that the ‘frosted glass’ option is now available for Pop!_OS 24.04 users. Once updating to the latest updates, via Settings / Desktop / Appearance is now a ‘Frosted Glass’ option under Style.”

The article also says that Cosmic developers plan to tag their next release next week, after which this frosted glass feature should propagate to the Cosmic packages on other Linux distributions.

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return on Friday.

Bits & Bobs: Talk to me, Ubuntu says

By Larry Cafiero

On Friday, Sourav Rudra on It’s FOSS reported that Canonical’s new AI tool wants to hear from you, literally.

The new AI tool is called Myna, and runs entirely on local hardware. It’s set for its debut with Ubuntu’s next release, which will be 26.10 scheduled for October.

According to the article, Jean-Baptiste Lallement, Canonical’s Director of Engineering for Ubuntu Desktop, posted the announcement, saying that voice dictation has become a common feature across modern platforms.

“For Ubuntu 26.10, the initial version of Myna is expected to be a desktop dictation tool built around Gnome and Wayland with a push-to-talk mechanism gatekeeping when your microphone accepts input.,” the article states.

The article also states that using Myna requires holding a hotkey, speaking, and letting go. A small activity indicator shows while it is listening, and the transcribed text lands wherever the cursor was sitting when dictation started.

PorteuX 2.7 released

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reported on Saturday that PorteuX, a Slackware-based distro, released its latest version – version 2.7 – with a wide variety of improvements.

“Coming almost four months after PorteuX 2.6, the PorteuX 2.7 release is powered by the latest and greatest Linux 7.1 kernel series, and features the latest KDE Plasma 6.7, Gnome 50.2, Xfce 4.20, LXQt 2.4, Cinnamon 6.6.8, Cosmic 1.0.16, MATE 1.28.2, and LXDE 0.11.1 desktop environments as standalone flavors,” the article states.

In addition, the article outlines how PorteuX 2.7 improves support for webcams, bumps overall performance by improving build and linker flags, improves NVIDIA GPU detection in the Xfce flavor, improves keyboard layout selection in the MATE flavor, improves the NetworkManager applet, and adds Noto fonts to fix some missing symbols.

Various packages also have been updated to their latest version based on upstream releases, so check out the release notes on the project’s GitHub page for extra reading.

GIMP 0.54 revived and Flatpaked

From the “that’s-great-but-why” desk, Michael Larabel on Phoronix reports on Saturday that a developer has revived an older version of GIMP – otherwise known as the GNU Image Manipulation Program – specifically, version 0.54 from 1996 and “Flatpak’ed” it for use by modern Linux desktops.

“What makes this version of GIMP from 1996 notable is that it was the last to use the Motif toolkit,” according to the article. It continues to state that GIMP 0.54 can now easily work on modern Linux desktops – complete with the Motif toolkit – thanks to a port to Flatpak for easy packaging and distribution.

The article also maintains the GIMP 0.54 port is hosted on the Gnome.org GitLab by developer balooii. “GIMP 0.54 isn’t useful in 2026 in practice besides those nostalgic over the old days with Motif and friends in the era before the GTK toolkit,” the article says. “I tried out this Flatpak’ed GIMP 0.54 and indeed was working out fine on a 2026 Linux distribution.”

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s always a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return on Friday.

Bits & Bobs: Arch AUR still under fire

By Larry Cafiero

On Friday, Swati Khandelwal of The Hacker News reported that attackers originally took over more than 400 packages in the Arch User Repository (AUR) last week and rewrote their build scripts to install a credential stealer on any machine that built them.

According to the article, “[t]he malware is a Rust binary built to harvest developer secrets. When it lands with root, it can also load an eBPF rootkit to hide itself. The AUR is Arch Linux’s community package collection, and it is separate from the official Arch repositories, which were not affected.”

The article suggests that if you installed or updated an AUR package on or after June 11, check it against the current affected-package lists before trusting the host. “The list of names is large, still growing, and not yet complete,” said the article.

Christine Hall at FOSS Force wrote on Sunday that “[j]ust hours after Arch sounded the all clear on a massive AUR malware purge, a new, stealthier campaign is slipping malicious code back into user packages.”

Michael Larabel at Phoronix suggests shutting down the Arch Users Repository until this situation can be fixed.

“At this stage it’s a bit surprising they don’t completely shutdown AUR until they can better verify the security and safety of this user-supplied repository or at least implement new safeguards on changes,” the Phoronix article states.

Questing Quokka reaches end of life

Ubuntu 25.10, also known as “Questing Quokka,” is scheduled to reach its end-of-life in July 2026. After this date, the version will no longer receive security updates or support from Canonical.

For the unitiated, what that means is that the Isle of Man firm will no longer provide security updates for the distro after July 9, 2026.

According to an article in Linux Compatible, there is a simple solution to this: Update to Ubuntu 26.04 Resolute Raccoon.

“Running the standard upgrade tool early keeps the system stable and prevents the usual command line headaches that come with chasing dead repositories,” the article states. “Waiting until the last moment only guarantees a rushed migration and a potentially broken desktop environment.”

Well, there. You have been warned, Ubuntu users. Update early to avoid the last-minute rush.

Linux kernel 7.1 is on the clock

Marcus Nestor at 9 to 5 Linux reports Sunday that Linux kernel 7.1 is now available for download, featuring enhanced hardware support, filesystem and networking improvements, security enhancements, and several other changes.

“Probably the biggest change of the Linux 7.1 kernel series is a new NTFS file system implementation, which has been in the works for the last four years, featuring full write support with delayed allocation, iomap, and folio integration to improve write performance, better stability, and a new suite of userspace utilities called ntfsprogs-plus,” the article states.

The article continues to announce that “[a]mong other changes, Linux kernel 7.1 enables Intel’s Flexible Return and Event Delivery (FRED) feature by default, introduces CPU Memory (CMEM) Latency PMU support for NVIDIA Tegra410 SoCs, adds BPF fsession support for the IBM System/390 architecture, and adds seccomp () support to the Alpha architecture.”

Now that Linux kernel 7.1 is out, the merge window will soon open for the next major kernel series, Linux 7.2, which is expected in mid or late August 2026.

And that’s all for today. Don’t forget: Distro of the Week appears Wednesday – and it’s a good one on hand – and Bits and Bobs will return on Friday.