Svobodný software

The Apple System Management Controller (SMC) driver was successfully merged this week into Linux 6.17 for being able to reboot modern Apple M1 / M2 Macs under Linux (the Apple M3 / M4 Linux support remains in development). It's the latest improvement for Apple Silicon on the upstream Linux kernel compared to the downstream Asahi Linux code that has been carrying the SMC driver and other in-development/tentative patches...

The AMD Radeon RX 480 / RX 580 "Polaris" graphics cards remain very popular on the Steam Survey and among enthusiasts/desktop users at large even though they are nearly a decade old. The nine year old Polaris graphics cards have aged well in the marketplace and are an affordable choice. For Linux users they continue enjoying strong open-source driver support. It turns out Linux creator Linus Torvalds himself is still relying on an AMD Radeon RX 580 with one of his main systems...

Another change proposal filed recently for the Fedora Linux 43 release is to hardlink identical files within /usr by default for RPM-provided files that are 100% identical and can be then deduplicated to help conserve disk space and increase system efficiency...

Upstreamed to the Linux kernel back in 2019 was the Lockdown security module for opt-in hardware/kernel security restrictions. It was a difficult and contentious process getting to the Linux kernel but then was left without any formal maintainer shortly after being mainlined. Now for helping to renew this Linux security module, two developers have stepped up to takeover maintainership of Lockdown...

Libinput 1.29 was just released as the newest version of this open-source input handling library used on the modern Linux desktop both under X.Org and Wayland environments...

In recent days there have been an increasing flow of leaks surrounding the Legion Go 2 as the next-generation handheld from Lenovo. The Lenovo Legion Go 2 is reported to be launching later this year with an AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme SoC, 144Hz OLED display, and a variety of other hardware upgrades over the original Lenovo Legion Go. Linux driver activity around the Legion Go 2 has begun...

The Linux 6.17 kernel has merged a new driver for powering up the Imagination PowerVR-based graphics processor found within the Alibaba T-HEAD TH1520 RISC-V SoC. This power sequencing driver is just for being able to power-up the GPU before the actual graphics driver can takeover...