GNU/Linux Gains on Laptops

• Writing With a Linux Laptop

  Open source solutions like Linux provide for greater productivity; check out our screencast highlighting how a Linux Laptop functions.

• Google Updates: Security in motion, Linux in launcher and Ethereum in the sin bin

  Back to Google proper, and Chrome OS. After wowing us with a promise of Linux compatibility, it has now emerged that the integration could run deeper than we thought. The latest news out of Mountain View is that Linux apps will be treated like any others - that means you'll be able to launch them from the app launcher, which is cooler than we even expected.

• Pixelbook and “Nami” Chromebooks the first to get Linux GPU acceleration in Project Crostini

  I don’t have a Pixelbook for testing right now, otherwise, I’d pop it into Developer Mode and jump on the Canary channel. However, I do still have a loaner Acer Chromebook Spin 13, so I’ll give it a go later today and see if the newly added code from early this morning is there in the Canary Channel; if it is, I’ll circle back with observations on how well it does or doesn’t work for the Android emulator in Android Studio and possibly a game or two using Steam.

• Pixelbook and 'Nami' Chromebooks the First To Get Linux GPU Acceleration in Project Crostini

  I've been following the bug report that tracks progress on adding GPU acceleration for the Linux container in Chrome OS and there's good news today. The first two Chrome OS boards should now, or very soon, be able to try GPU hardware acceleration with the new startup parameter found last month. The bug report says the -enable-gpu argument was added to the Eve and Nami boards.

• Chrome OS to test early GPU support for Linux apps soon

  If you’ve kept up with Chrome OS in the past six months or so, you’ll know that one of the more interesting new features to launch is Linux apps support. While this has potential to introduce all sorts of new applications to Chrome OS, there are some features missing that hold it back, in this early stage. One of the most anticipated features, graphics acceleration (or GPU support), necessary for running Linux games and some other apps, will be available to test soon on Chrome OS.

Second Godot 3.1 Beta

• Godot 3.1 Beta 2

  We entered the release freeze last week with Godot 3.1 beta 1, and many high priority bug reports have been fixed since then. We're now publishing a new beta 2 snapshot for testers to work with. This new release fixes various crash scenarios, as well as a performance regression in the GLES backend. We're still aiming for a release by the end of the month, so we're under a tight schedule. From now on dev focus is on release-critical issues that would seriously hamper Godot 3.1's usability and features. Contrarily to our 3.0.x maintenance releases, which include only thoroughly reviewed and backwards-compatible bug fixes, the 3.1 version includes all the new features (and subsequent bugs!) merged in the master branch since January 2018, and especially all those showcased on our past devblogs. It's been almost a year since the 3.0 release and close to 6,000 commits, so expect a lot of nice things in the final 3.1 version!

• Godot 3.1 Beta 2 Released With OpenGL ES Performance Fix

  The developers behind Godot, one of the leading open-source game engines, have announced their second beta release for the upcoming Godot 3.1 feature release. Godot 3.1 initially entered beta earlier this month as stepping towards the first major release of this cross-platform game engine since Godot 3.0 last year. Godot 3.1 is preparing OpenGL ES 2.0 rendering support, continued work around virtual reality (VR) support, 3D soft body physics capabilities, constructive solid geometry, BPTC texture compression, a new visual shader editor, WebSockets support, and various game developer/editor improvements.

Software, apps are surveillance tools: Privacy activist Richard M Stallman

Richard M Stallman, a US-based free software and privacy activist, said on Friday that modern mobile phones are a dream tool that Joseph Stalin would have loved to have, as they allow indiscriminate surveillance of every user. Delivering a public lecture at RV College of Engineering here, Stallman said: “They never go off. There is no button to switch them off. At best, they pretend to turn off but they are always listening and sending back information to servers owned by the manufacturers of the operating systems. They would’ve been (Joseph) Stalin’s dream, but unfortunately for him the technology didn’t exist then, but sadly for us, it does now.” He warned students from uploading his photographs or videos from the lecture on Facebook, WhatsApp or Instagram—all social messaging/networking sites/applications—claiming that they were “the three big mouths of the surveillance monster.”