Microsoft has released Coreutils for Windows, allowing a stack of familiar “Linux-like” command-line utilities to run natively on Windows. The project is based on uutils, the Rust-based reimplementation of GNU coreutils that Ubuntu (mostly) has adopted in recent releases. Microsoft’s package bundles uutils’ coreutils and findutils as well as a GNU-compatible grep in a single binary. It offers tools like cat, cp, ls, mv and uptime. Commands that use POSIX-only features are excluded, meaning chmod, chown, kill and others aren’t included. What’s notable – *nix tools working their way into the Windows ecosystem is notable – is that this isn’t […]
It's FOSS turns 14 tomorrow. Incidentally, my son turns 1 tomorrow as well. Two milestones the same day call for celebration, right?
But there is something important that I wanted to share with you and it relates to the future of It's FOSS.
The thing is that Google Search is gone. Not broken but gone. What replaces it is an AI that reads the web, summarizes it, and hands you the answer directly. No links. No clicks. No visits to the sites that actually wrote the content.
For the past two decades, a quiet but fair deal powered the open web: you search, you click, we earn a little from ads, and we use that to keep writing. That deal is over. Google now takes our content, serves the answer, and the publisher gets nothing. Not even a visit.
Since the launch of ChatGPT, It's FOSS has already lost 80% of its Google search traffic. And it's alarming now.
I built It's FOSS because I love Linux and open-source software. Not to get rich. I built it because I wanted a place where people could learn Linux for free, stay informed, and feel part of a community that actually cares about what open-source software means. For years, that worked. Ad revenue kept the lights on. We kept creating informational content that helped Linux users all around the world.
That model is now broken, and no tweak to our content strategy will fix it. This is not an algorithm we can optimize around.
The big publishers will survive this. They have corporate backing, licensing deals, and investors to absorb the losses. We don't. What we have is you.
If It's FOSS has ever helped you, fixed a problem, taught you something new, saved you a frustrating hour, this is the moment to return the favor. You want us to continue for 14 more years, right?
Becoming a Plus member keeps this alive:
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To mark 14 years of It's FOSS (and my son's first birthday), I'm offering $30 off the lifetime membership this week. This one-time payment also solidifies the trust you have in It's FOSS and keeps us going in the age of AI slop.
Not in a position to subscribe? A one-time donation helps too. Every contribution, whatever the size, is a vote for keeping It's FOSS alive, keeping the open web alive.
I've spent years writing about open source because I believe software freedom matters, using a free operating system matters. I still do. But this freedom also needs people willing to sustain the communities that talk about it.
I'm asking you to be one of those people.
📰 News That Matter
Proton has given us some back-to-back updates. There's an encryption overhaul that makes uploads up to 3x faster and downloads up to 2x faster, thanks to a cryptography rewrite. News on how a native GUI client for Linux is in the works, and an official CLI offering for Drive that works on Linux, Windows, and macOS.
A lot has landed in the DocSpace 3.7 release. You get AI-generated files, DeepSeek, xAI and Google AI support, a complete rework of form filling rooms that now handle PDF creation, room tagging, bulk deletion, and new admin controls.
Similarly, Collabora have introduced CODE 26.04, possibly their biggest release yet. It includes AI assistance across all three editors, a reworked document comparison tool in Writer, per-user sheet views in Calc, 14 new spreadsheet functions, and a follow-me presentation mode in Impress. Yeah... AI everywhere.
Need to send a large file without uploading it to someone else's server first? CheezyPizza does it browser to browser over WebRTC, with no account, no size cap, and no middleman.
Not open source software but Melia is a new Linux desktop email client that takes privacy seriously in ways most clients don't bother with. Tracking pixels are neutralized, incoming emails are verified against SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, and senders whose display names don't match their addresses get flagged automatically.
If you find Linux Mint running slowly, try disabling animations and window effects. It may improve the performance a yiny bit and tiny bits help when you are struggling with performance.
Bambu Lab has been on a path to vendor lock-in, and even after outcry from the community over some of its recent moves, they don't seem to be learning anything.
If you are on a GNOME setup, then you can enable certain user interface settings on the Resources app to display important usage and hardware-related details in the sidebar at all times.
Go into the "Preferences" menu via the hamburger button (looks like three lines), then under the "General" tab, look for these options and enable them:
There have been many instances of the open source community striking back at projects that locked down. We have a puzzle that will test your knowledge of such occurrences.
Can you help this Arch user? 🤣
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On June 7, 1954, Alan Turing, the mathematician who conceived the theoretical blueprint for modern computers and helped crack Enigma cipher at Bletchley Park, reportedly took his own life at age 41.
His work helped shorten World War II and laid the foundation for every computer running today.
🧑🤝🧑 From the Community: A newcomer is asking which web browsers his fellow FOSSers are using. Care to contribute?
FOSS Weekly #26.24: Dank Linux Review, BitWarden Alternative, Mint Tips (And an Important Message)
Microsoft has released its own version of Coreutils to bring Linux commands to Windows command prompt. If you can't beat them, join them? This is a big move from the company that once called Linux a "cancer".
KDE Linux is shaping up well, as May's progress update shows the project dropping its AUR dependency, switching to kde-builder for a faster and more distro-agnostic build system, and replacing KWalletManager with the newer KeepSecret app.
Valve brought the Steam Deck OLED back after months of absence and quietly raised prices by nearly 50% to cover rising component costs. People bought them anyway. North America sold out overnight, and if you've been waiting for prices to normalize, don't.
M5Stack's CardputerZero is a credit card-sized Linux computer built around a Raspberry Pi Compute Module Zero, with a 46-key keyboard, 1.9-inch display with HDMI out up to 1080p, 8MP Sony camera, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, and a 1,500mAh battery.
AlmaLinux Day is coming to Los Angeles on July 18, scheduled the day before SIGGRAPH 2026 to catch the VFX and studio crowd before the larger conference kicks off.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
A new tool that feels like a reverse WSL.
Software that feels open source, but isn't.
Getting the fastest Arch Linux download mirrors.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
🧠 What We’re Thinking About
GitHub Copilot's metered billing went live this week. What was a predictable monthly subscription is now usage-based, with each request priced dynamically by model and context.
The thing is that you cannot avoid AI specially if you are working as a sysadmin or DevOps. The best way is to use AI as a tool to assist you in your workflow. There is this new book that guides you to build intelligent automation using LLMs, RAG, and AI agents for monitoring, troubleshooting, and system administration. You don't want to be left behind, after all.
Your Arch mirror list from install day is probably not your fastest option anymore. reflector lets you pull the most recently synced HTTPS mirrors by country in one command. rate-mirrors benchmarks them and picks the fastest without you needing to specify anything.
Want to try Alpine Linux without touching your main system? The installation process is text-based and a bit different from what most distros do, so running it in VirtualBox first makes sense.
Steam is proprietary. So are Obsidian, Warp, Docker Desktop, and the Snap Store backend. Thirteen tools that regularly fool Linux users into assuming otherwise, with open source alternatives listed.
Desktop Linux is mostly neglected by the industry but loved by the community. For the past 13 years, It's FOSS has been helping people use Linux on their personal computers. And we are now facing the existential threat from AI models stealing our content.
If you like what we do and would love to support our work, please become It's FOSS Plus member. It costs less than the cost of a McDonald Happy Meal a month, and you get an ad-free reading experience with the satisfaction of helping the desktop Linux community.
ZimaBoard was the device I began my homelab journey with a couple of years ago. I tried their latest device, ZimaCube 2 and shared the experience in this review. If money is not a problem and you are looking for the comfort of owning a homelab, Zima devices are worth it.
Jan AI came close to replacing Ollama for Bhuwan with its one-click model downloads, built-in cloud provider support, and local API server. But performance-wise, it disappointed.
✨ Apps and Projects Highlights
WSL runs Linux inside Windows. Winpodx does the opposite. It spins up a Windows container using Podman and streams individual Windows apps to your Linux desktop via FreeRDP.
In GNOME, if you have multiple keyboard layouts enabled, click on the keyboard layout button in the quick settings panel and click the "Show Keyboard Layout" button to get a quick overview of that layout.
That chance encounter sparked a friendship that led Ada to write what is now recognized as the world's first computer program, over a decade before the word "computer" referred to anything other than a person doing sums.
Microsoft stellt auf seiner Entwicklerkonferenz das Paket Coreutils vor, eine in Rust geschriebene Umsetzung der GNU Coreutils. Es soll der Vereinheitlichung der Befehlsstruktur auf verschiedenen Plattformen dienen.
The big news is that Linux distros are getting a standard Projects folder alongside Documents, Music, and Downloads. Most people already create one manually, but now it's official, and apps can start using it as a default location too. So it's more than just 'mkdir Projects", it has actual use.
Although, I am curious what kind of icon this new Projects directoy will get 😄
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
Firefox quietly using Brave's ad blocker.
A series of new Ubuntu releases.
Warp terminal going open source.
Hackers hijacking a package and publishing it to PyPI.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
📰 Linux and Open Source News
Firefox 149 has quietly shipped Brave's open source adblock-rust engine with no mention in the release notes. It's disabled by default with no UI, but can be enabled via about:config.
MinIO's GitHub repo has been archived again after going into maintenance mode last year. If you're running it in production, then it is time for a change.
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS "Resolute Raccoon" is out. You get GNOME 50, Linux kernel 7.0, Wayland-only, five new default apps, deb packages back in App Center, and post-quantum crypto out of the box.
It's flavors have also gotten releases, and we have already checked out what Kubuntu 26.04 and Lubuntu 26.04 offer.
A flaw in Elementary Data's GitHub Actions workflow let an attacker push a backdoored version to PyPI in under ten minutes. If you have elementary-data 0.23.3 installed, you got work to do.
LVFS, the service behind Linux firmware updates, has one full-time developer and no security team. Vendors consuming millions of downloads without contributing now face download quotas and feature restrictions until they sponsor the project.
Fedora 44 is out after a two-week delay. It is powered by Linux 6.19, includes GNOME 50 and Plasma 6.6, has NTSYNC for better Windows game performance, and a completely refreshed Games Lab spin.
AI is coming to Ubuntu, and Canonical's approach is local-first with open-weight models delivered via snaps.
There is a petition asking for a native Linux version of a 3D architectural modeling program Rhino 3D. If you can, please sign it. This may result in bringing a mainstream app to Linux, which may help grow Linux adoption.
🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials, and Learnings
GSConnect is the GNOME extension that brings KDE Connect to your desktop, letting you share files, sync notifications, use your phone as a trackpad, and mount Android folders over Wi-Fi.
Forgot your Ubuntu root password? You can boot into recovery mode, use the dpkg repair option to get a root shell, and reset it with passwd. Work only on systems with a root password set.
LeafKVM is an open source KVM-over-IP device in a CNC aluminum case, built on Rust and Buildroot.
Tired of AI fluff and misinformation in your Google feed? Get real, trusted Linux content. Add It’s FOSS as your preferred source and see our reliable Linux and open-source stories highlighted in your Discover feed and search results.
WSL9x is a project that does the opposite of what you'd expect. Instead of running Linux apps on Windows, it runs a modern Linux kernel 6.19 inside Windows 95, 98, or ME
Resharing the terminal customization video for the new readers. It's a detailed, step by step tutorial on how to make your terminal look as beautiful as the ones you see in our screenshots.
You can use the Vitals GNOME Shell extension to add more system monitor readings to the GNOME top panel. Click on Vitals in the top panel, and select the values you want in the panel.
Deselect the ones you don't need to hide them from the panel. Do note that the hidden ones are still visible when you are in the drop-down view. Hidden or not, these values are all still accessible in the dropdown view of the extension.
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On May 2, 1983, Microsoft introduced its two-button Microsoft Mouse alongside the new Microsoft Word processor. Despite manufacturing around 100,000 units for IBM and IBM-compatible PCs, the company sold only 5,000 before eventually finding success with a much-improved version.
🧑🤝🧑 From the Community: Pro FOSSer Dan is in a limbo where an update broke file thumbnails on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS.
And I am working on a complete overhaul of the It's FOSS Plus portal. Stay tuned for that.
FOSS Weekly #26.18: Ubuntu's AI Move, New Entry in Home Directory, New Ubuntu Terminal, Fedora 44 Release and More Linux Stuff
Ubuntu 26.04 is releasing today. As a long-term support release, it will be supported till at least 2031, making it an important upgrade for many users.
If you’re currently on Ubuntu 24.04 or even 25.10, you probably have a few questions about upgrading. Should you do it now? Is it worth it? I’ve addressed those in a dedicated article.
On a related note, Fedora 44 faced another delay but is now expected to release tomorrow, April 24.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
A young Polish developer fixing 20 year old Linux bug.
A new privacy-first cloud service.
Russian CPUs being dropped from Linux.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
📰 Linux and Open Source News
Linux 7.1 is dropping support for Baikal SoCs, the Russian ARM-based processors that were intended to give Russian state enterprises a domestic alternative to Intel and AMD.
Cal.com, the open source Calendly alternative, has gone closed source. The stated reason is that AI can now scan public repos and find exploitable vulnerabilities far faster than before.
A 20-year-old bug in the Enlightenment E16 window manager, introduced in 2006, was found and fixed this month by a 21-year-old graduate student who daily drives the 1999-era window manager.
MZLA Technologies, the Mozilla subsidiary behind Thunderbird, has launched Thunderbolt, an open source, self-hostable AI client aimed at organizations that can't send sensitive data to third-party AI services.
Elsewhere in the world of Mozilla, Firefox's new mascot Kit generated more drama than any browser mascot should've. A Reddit post used they/them pronouns to introduce the cartoon Firefox character; someone noticed a few weeks later, and the predictable cycle followed.
If you're already using Tuta for email and calendar and have been wondering where the cloud storage was, it's now in closed beta. Tuta Drive uses the same post-quantum hybrid encryption as the rest of the suite, is hosted in Germany, and is zero-knowledge by design.
Chapter 7 of our Terminal Basics series covers everything you need to know about the cp command for copying single files, multiple files, renaming during a copy, using -r for directories, and handling overwrites safely with -n and -i.
If your Linux Mint desktop feels a bit plain and you have RAM to spare, we have covered nine Cinnamon extensions and built-in effects worth trying for anyone who wants to make the desktop feel a bit more alive.
Compiling your own kernel sounds intimidating, but it's mostly a long sequence of well-defined steps. The journey involves fetching and verifying the source, configuring with menuconfig, building and installing modules, headers, and the kernel itself.
Linux gamers rejoice! A gaming console has been announced that runs an Arch-based distro.
Tired of AI fluff and misinformation in your Google feed? Get real, trusted Linux content. Add It’s FOSS as your preferred source and see our reliable Linux and open-source stories highlighted in your Discover feed and search results.
Managing a handful of containers from the terminal is fine until it isn't. Pods is a clean Adwaita-native GUI for Podman and Docker that handles the everyday tasks.
📽️ Videos for You
And I share the new features in Ubuntu 26.04 in this video along with my opinions on (some of) them. Please watch it here.
In many Linux terminal emulators like GNOME Terminal, Ptyxis, etc. You can press CTRL+SHIFT+F to open a search interface for going through your scrollback history. This typically contains options for matchcase, whole words, and regular expressions.
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On April 21, 1988, Tandy Corporation announced it would clone IBM's PS/2, which was made possible only because IBM had opened up the license to its proprietary MCA bus patents after years of trying to lock competitors out.
The PS/2 was IBM's attempt to retake control of the PC market it had accidentally given away by publishing open hardware specs in 1981. It failed completely.
Within four years IBM was a minor player in its own market, and by 2005 it had exited PC manufacturing entirely, selling the division to Lenovo.
🧑🤝🧑 From the Community: FOSSers are deliberating whether CAMM2 memory will be the next thing in computer hardware.
FOSS Weekly #26.17: Ubuntu 26.04 Release, Firefox Controversy, Positive News on Age-verification and More Linux Stuff
The big new, and it’s good, is coming from France. The government’s digital agency DINUM is moving its workstations from Windows to Linux, with every French ministry required to submit a plan by Autumn 2026 to reduce dependence on non-European software.
Two very different directions. Both worth paying attention to.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
A new Linux kernel release.
France replacing Windows with Linux.
Microsoft locking out open source developers.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by Aiven.
Aiven just launched a permanent free tier for OpenSearch, offering a fully managed, persistent playground for your projects. With 4GB RAM and 20GB storage, it’s specifically engineered for the memory-heavy demands of AI: support for k-NN indexing, vector search, and RAG pipelines.
No credit card required and no trial limits. What else can you ask for?
Two related kernel AI stories this week. First, Linux has shipped an official AI coding assistants policy where AI help is allowed, but every patch needs a human accountable for it. Second, Greg Kroah-Hartman has been running what looks like an AI-assisted fuzzer on the kernel in a branch he calls "clanker."
A bug report filed in 2005 asking for per-screen virtual desktops in KDE has finally been addressed. The feature lets each monitor show a different virtual desktop independently rather than all switching together.
Linux 7.0 landed this week with a wide spread of improvements. Intel gets Nova Lake audio and better Arc GPU temperature reporting. AMD gets early Zen 6 performance profiling support and GPU groundwork for future hardware.
🧠 What We’re Thinking About
Session has lost all its paid developers and is running on volunteers. Donations are keeping the infrastructure alive until July 8, but development is effectively frozen unless they reach their $1 million donation goal.
And if you are absolutely new to Linux, it helps to start with the basics first. Not commands, but the kind of foundational things that make your early terminal experience far less confusing.
Once you get comfortable with the essentials, you might start exploring distributions more deeply. But not all rolling release distros are made equal. Arch gives you everything and expects you to handle it. Manjaro smooths the edges. Void is independent and leans stable. Gentoo compiles everything. Which one would you go for?
And somewhere along that journey, you’ll inevitably hit the classic fork in the road: Vim or nano. Nano works exactly like you'd expect a text editor to work, with controls visible on screen. Vim, on the other hand, runs on modes, muscle memory, and a learning curve that takes real commitment.
📚 Linux eBook bundle (ending this week)
No Starch Press needs no introduction. They have published some of the best books on Linux. And they are running an ebook bundle deal on Humble Bundle.
Plus, part of your purchase supports Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
👷 AI, Homelab and Hardware Corner
At some point every homelab stops being manageable by memory alone. Our roundup of dashboard tools is the answer to that.
Tired of AI fluff and misinformation in your Google feed? Get real, trusted Linux content. Add It’s FOSS as your preferred source and see our reliable Linux and open-source stories highlighted in your Discover feed and search results.
Firefox has a native color picker called Eyedropper that helps you know the exact hex color code of a specific color on a webpage. It is available inside Menu -> More Tools -> Eyedropper.
You can also right-click on an empty place in the toolbar and select "Customize Toolbar..."
Here, drag and drop the "Developer" tool to the toolbar. Now, you can access the Eyedropper from this button as well.
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On April 16, 1959, John McCarthy gave the first public presentation of LISP at MIT. The list-processing language he built from scratch became the foundation of artificial intelligence programming and introduced concepts like garbage collection still used today.
🧑🤝🧑 From the Community: One of our regular FOSSers has posted about Hardware Freedom Day 2026; are you celebrating?
Linus Torvalds created two of the most widely used tools in modern computing: the Linux kernel and Git.
Git, of course, is a version control system primarily used by programmers.
But Theena makes a strong case that Git and plain text are the best tools a writer can use. Not just for backup but for building a writing practice that is truly their own..
At its core, the argument is about breaking free from platform dependency, long-term preservation, and treating your body of work as something worth designing around rather than just storing somewhere convenient.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
sudo tips and tweaks.
Apt's new version has useful features.
Opera GX arriving as a gaming browser for Linux.
A Linux driver proposal to catch malicious USB devices.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
Tired of AI fluff and misinformation in your Google feed? Get real, trusted Linux content. Add It’s FOSS as your preferred source and see our reliable Linux and open-source stories highlighted in your Discover feed and search results.
Not open source software but Opera GX, the gaming-focused Chromium browser that's been on Windows and macOS for years, has finally landed on Linux. Sourav took the early access build for a spin and tested the features it's known for, like GX Control for capping RAM and CPU usage while gaming and GX Cleaner for cleaning up junk data.
The Linux kernel is finally dropping i486 support, queued for Linux 7.1. The first patch removes the relevant Kconfig build options, with a fuller cleanup covering 80 files and over 14,000 lines of legacy code still to follow.
Proton has launched two new things: Proton Workspace, a bundled suite of all their services aimed at businesses looking for a privacy-first alternative to Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, and Proton Meet, an end-to-end encrypted video conferencing tool using the open source MLS protocol.
A proposal has been submitted to the Linux kernel mailing list for a new HID driver called hid-omg-detect that passively monitors USB keyboard-like devices for suspicious behavior.
Another proposal, but for Fedora was recently struck down. It looked to move per-user environment variable management from shell RC files into systemd.
YOUR support keeps us going, keeps us resisting the established media and big tech, keeps us independent. And it costs less than a McDonald's Happy Meal a month.
Support us via Plus membership and additionally, you:
✅ Get 5 FREE eBooks on Linux, Docker and Bash ✅ Enjoy an ad-free reading experience ✅ Flaunt badges in the comment section and forum ✅ Help creation of educational Linux materials for everyone
No Starch Press needs no introduction. They have published some of the best books on Linux. And they are running an ebook bundle deal on Humble Bundle.
You can copy a file in Nautilus by pressing Ctrl+C, then press Ctrl+M to paste it as a symbolic link instead of an actual copy. This is a handy way to create a symlink without ever needing to open a terminal!
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🎋 Fun in the FOSSverse
In this members-only crossword, you will have to name systemd's ctl commands.
An appropriate meme on the OS-level age verification topic.
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On April 8, 1991, a small team at Sun Microsystems quietly relocated to work in secret on a project codenamed "Oak", a programming language that would eventually be renamed Java and go on to become one of the most widely used languages in the world, powering everything from Android apps to enterprise software.
In the previous newsletter, I discussed how various distros are handling the age verification laws. At the end of the article, I speculated that we would see a few existing or new distros coming up with "no age verification" as their unique feature.
Guess what? We have a new distro called Ageless Linux which is created specifically to refuse compliance with OS-level age verification laws.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
Things you can do Linux but not on Windows
Chrome on ARM Linux (aka Raspberry Pi).
A new web browser for Linux users.
GNOME 50 and Fedora Ashahi releases
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
📰 Linux and Open Source News
GNOME 50 is here and X11 is not. Wayland is all the way in this new release. Upcoming distros like Ubuntu 26.04 and Fedora 44 will have it. Rolling distros like Arch should also get it soon.
Google has officially announced Chrome for ARM64 Linux, with a release targeted for Q2 2026. That means Raspberry Pi users, Snapdragon laptop owners, and anyone else running ARM hardware will get the Chrome experience on Linux.
Although, not open source, Kagi's Orion browser has made it to Linux as a public beta, and it's genuinely interesting because it's one of the browsers on the platform not built on Chromium or Firefox's engine. It is based on WebKit and works okayish on GNOME.
Fedora Asahi Remix 43 arrives with Mac Pro support. In case you did not know, Asahi is the project bring Linux to Apple's Silicon processors.
AI companies like Anthropic, OpenAI, Meta etc have put $12.5M into Open Source Security, managed by Linux Foundation. This is funny in a way. They are putting together a fund to fix the problem their AI tools created in the first place.
YOUR support keeps us going, keeps us resisting the established media and tech, keeps us independent. And it costs less than a McDonald's Happy Meal.
Opt for the Plus membership to:
✅ Get 5 FREE eBooks on Linux, Docker and Bash ✅ Enjoy an ad-free reading experience ✅ Flaunt badges in the comment section and forum ✅ To support creation of educational Linux materials
A clean beginner's guide to Markdown covering the core syntax: headings, text formatting, links, images, lists, and block quotes. It comes with a downloadable cheat sheet and a few recommendations for online editors if you want to try it without installing anything.
Windows users have been conditioned to ask, "But can Linux do X?" This piece by Roland flips it around and asks what Linux can do that Windows can't. The answers range from practical (live sessions, moving installs between machines, reviving old hardware) to genuinely impressive (swapping kernels, choosing filesystems, replacing every layer of your stack).
📚 eBook bundle on AI
Inside this 20+ eBook library, you’ll gain expert insights from practical lessons like Learn Python Programming, 4E and the LLM Engineer's Handbook. These massively efficient tools save you time and effort so you can prioritize other important tasks and systems.
Your purchase supports the World Central Kitchen organization.
👷 AI, Homelab and Hardware Corner
If your Raspberry Pi homelab is freezing up under load, the default 200 MB swap is probably the first thing worth looking at.
✨ Apps and Projects Highlights
If your GNOME top panel has turned into a wall of icons, Veil is worth a look. It's a shell extension that lets you hide panel items behind a toggle arrow.
📽️ Videos for You
You could move away from Google today if you wanted to, and DuckDuckGo is one of the good ones to consider.
In Nautilus file manager, you can press CTRL+F to start a search in the current directory and CTRL+SHIFT+F to search across the other system folders. To go even further, you can add new search locations via the Search settings.
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And, if you use the shortcut CTRL+ALT+O after selecting a file or folder, you can go to it's location in the file manager. Do note that this works in the Search and Recent pages of the file manager.
🎋 Fun in the FOSSverse
Do you know the brain behind Debian? This Ian Murdock quiz will test your knowledge.
🤣 Meme of the Week: We must protect it at all costs!
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On March 17, 1988, Apple sued Microsoft for copyright infringement over the look and feel of the Windows GUI. Apple's argument was that Windows borrowed too heavily from the Macintosh interface it had debuted in 1984. The case dragged on for years before a judge ruled that Apple had only limited rights to the design elements in question.
🧑🤝🧑 From the Community: One of our regular Pro FOSSers is having an issue with CUPS on antiX Linux; can you help?
FOSS Weekly #26.12: GNOME 50 Release, Fedora for Apple, New Ageless Linux, Manjaro Drama and More
If rumors and Reuters are to be believed, SUSE Linux us up for sale again. Again because it has changed owners several times in the past. IBM bought Red Hat Linux for $34 billion 6 years ago. It would be interesting to see who grabs SUSE. I hope it's not Microsoft.
By the way, not seeing new articles from It's FOSS in your feed reader? That's because there is an ongoing issue with the RSS feed as I am migrating to FeedPress. Please bear it with me.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
EA slowly moving towards Linux.
Firefox's redesign has been leaked.
Linux Mint keyboard shortcut video.
MidnightBSD saying no to age verification.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
📰 Linux and Open Source News
EA is hiring an anti-cheat engineer to bring Javelin to ARM64, and tucked into the job listing is a mention of exploring Linux and Proton support in the future. After ditching Linux for Apex Legends in 2024, it's a surprising turn. But I wouldn't hold my breath on this.
Firefox's Proton UI has been around since 2021 and honestly looks it. Leaked internal mockups show Mozilla is working on something called "Nova," a significant visual overhaul. Tabs, the address bar, and the toolbar are merged into a single floating strip; rounded corners are everywhere; flat grays are out in favor of gradients, and the private window gets a full dark-purple makeover.
MidnightBSD has updated its license to bar residents of Brazil and California from using the project, with Colorado, Illinois, and New York on the list if their respective pending age verification bills pass.
🧠 What We’re Thinking About
The age verification laws spreading across US states are making distro maintainers uncomfortable, and responses are all over the place. Ubuntu and Fedora are working on minimal local APIs to tick the compliance box without doing anything too invasive. MidnightBSD is outright banning people from using it (as mentioned above).
YOUR support keeps us going, keeps us resisting the established media and tech, keeps us independent. And it costs less than a McDonald's Happy Meal.
Opt for the Plus membership to:
✅ Get 5 FREE eBooks on Linux, Docker and Bash ✅ Enjoy an ad-free reading experience ✅ Flaunt badges in the comment section and forum ✅ To support creation of educational Linux materials
Wordcloud is a Python tool that turns any list of words into a visual word cloud image, right from the terminal. You can feed it a text file, tweak the resolution, swap the font, change the background color, or use a mask image to shape the output around a custom silhouette.
Some practical privacy tips that don't require a computer science degree or a paranoia spiral. Our article covers the basics well, from securing your email and browser to picking better cloud storage and messaging apps.
Ever wanted a desktop that looks like it belongs on r/unixporn? We have an i3 customization guide that covers a lot, from basic keybindings and color schemes to transparent status bars and per-workspace app assignments.
GSConnect is the GNOME-friendly way to link your Android phone and Linux machine, built on top of KDE Connect. Once paired, you can transfer files, share the clipboard, get phone notifications on your desktop, and use your phone as a remote mouse.
FRANK OS is a full desktop operating system, complete with a Start menu, overlapping windows, Alt+Tab switching, and a ZX Spectrum emulator, running on an RP2350 microcontroller.
On GNOME, first install Tiling Shell. Then, when you right-click on the titlebar of a window, you get various tiling options. Do keep in mind that not all apps will support this.
🎋 Fun in the FOSSverse
Match Linux apps with their functions in this puzzle. And yes, fresh new puzzles are coming soon 😄
🤣 Meme of the Week: Winslop doesn't know what consent means.
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On March 9, 1955, a program called "Director" was demonstrated on MIT's Whirlwind computer—automatically managing system resources while user code ran. It's considered one of the earliest rudimentary operating systems ever created.
As governments push age checks deeper into apps and operating systems, what once sounded like a safety measure is starting to feel a lot like surveillance.
And it’s not just happening in the U.S. Reports suggest Brazil is also moving toward similar regulations. While this model may fit ecosystems like Apple and Microsoft, where operating systems are tightly tied to online accounts, the Linux world works very differently. Yet developers from projects like Fedora and Ubuntu are already discussing how such requirements might affect Linux.
We’ll be keeping close eye on how this evolves. Stay tuned.
Here are other highlights of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
Longer support for certain Linux kernels.
systemd troubleshooting tools
Xfce customization.
Microsoft hates Microslop.
LibreOffice quick tip.
A new consortium to unify the Arm software ecosystem.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
SPONSORED
AI coding assistants write code fast but do they pick safe dependencies? This is where Sonatype Guide comes in. It connects tools like Cursor, Copilot, and Claude Code to real-time open source intelligence via MCP, so vulnerable packages get flagged before they land in the open source project. Try it here.
The web's most popular UI library has outgrown Meta's ownership. React is now part of the Linux Foundation with neutral governance and eight platinum members on board. Technical decisions are independent from the board, of course.
Arm software got too complex for any one company to handle alone. CoreCollective just launched to fix that fragmentation problem. Free membership for anyone building on Arm. AMD, Google, Microsoft and Red Hat are already in.
LTS kernel support windows just got extended after being cut to two years back in 2023. Linux 6.6 and 6.12 now get four-years of support instead. Greg Kroah-Hartman updated the schedule after discussions with companies and maintainers.
AI's RAM appetite just killed another hardware project. Orange Pi and Manjaro spent two years building a Linux gaming handheld, cleared regulatory approvals, and got everything ready to ship. Now it's sitting on ice because DDR5 chip prices are absurd.
Motorola just partnered with the GrapheneOS Foundation, and it was announced at MWC 2026. The two plan to collaborate on research, software improvements, and new security features in the coming months. If you did not know already, Graphene is an Android distribution that ditches Google's data collection layer entirely and has long been the go-to for anyone serious about privacy.
Few Linux distributions attract as much criticism as Ubuntu. From Snap complaints to Canonical decisions, the internet seems to have a long list of reasons to dislike it. But Ubuntu may not deserve nearly as much hate as it gets.
AI may not need your attention, but us humans do. YOUR support keeps us going. And it costs less than a McDonald's Happy Meal.
Opt for the Plus membership to:
✅ Get 5 FREE eBooks on Linux, Docker and Bash ✅ Enjoy an ad-free reading experience ✅ Flaunt badges in the comment section and forum ✅ To support creation of educational Linux materials
When stuff breaks on Linux, systemd already knows what happened. Systemctl shows which services crashed, journalctl has the error messages, and systemd-analyze tells you what's hogging boot time. Coredumpctl keeps snapshots of apps that died completely.
Got an old PC or Raspberry Pi collecting dust? Batocera, Lakka, and RetroPie turn them into plug-and-play retro consoles via USB or SD card.
A quick tip if you love to use LibreOffice. If a document has way too many images and you have to save multiple or all images from it, save it as an HTML document in a new folder. You'll get all the images from the document. Pretty neat 😄
By the way, we are working on a "Linux Mint Starter Pack" series for beginners. I'll share with you when it is done. In the mean time, you can get familiar with the Linux command line.
👷 AI, Homelab and Hardware Corner
Tired of feeding your photos to Google's AI? PhotoPrism runs locally on Docker, handles face recognition and tagging on your hardware.
✨ Apps and Projects Highlights
A Czech-based dev built a data center sim where you rack servers and run cables. No native Linux support but works with some FPS issues
Brave browser allows you to set a shortcut to copy the URL of the current tab. For this, go to Brave Settings -> System -> Shortcuts. Here, search for Copy URL and add a keybind to it.
In the screenshot above, CTRL+SHIFT+C is added as the shortcut. This overwrites the default inspect function, which it was mapped to earlier. So tread with caution and try to add a non-conflicting shortcut.
If your browser does not support this, you can use CTRL+L to access the address bar and then CTRL+C to copy the URL of the current tab.
📚 Don't Miss! Linux eBook bundle
Humble Bundle has brought back the "Linux for Seasoned Admins" ebook bundle offer (partner link). From the classic Linux Pocket Guide and my favorite, Efficient Linux at the Command Line, the bundle also has ebooks on Docker, Ansible, Kubernetes and other devops aspects of Linux.
And your purchase also supports the Code for America initiative.
🗓️ Tech Trivia: On March 1, 1960, the first LISP Programmer's Manual was released by John McCarthy's group at MIT. McCarthy had built a recursive, symbolic language that would go on to become the foundation of AI programming and outlast nearly every other high-level language of its era.
I know not everyone wants to hear about AI all the time. But at this point, it’s impossible to ignore what’s happening.
It has been just a year since Anthropic launched Claude Code and the impact has been staggering.
In recent months, engineers at Anthropic reportedly stopped writing code manually for large parts of their workflow. Instead, they’ve been shipping feature after feature with AI-assisted development. The velocity is unlike anything we’ve seen before.
And the market noticed. Claude’s latest model release this month reportedly wiped out trillions of dollars from IT stocks globally within a single week.
The barrier to uncovering digital identities is collapsing. AI isn’t just changing how code is written. It’s changing privacy, security, and the economics of entire industries.
But here’s the important part.
Every major computing shift felt destabilizing at first; from assembly to high-level languages, from physical servers to the cloud. We’re witnessing the beginning of a new era. And we’re still early.
Here's the highlight of this edition of FOSS Weekly:
Red Hat open-sourcing a tool.
Some dock options for your system.
Lightweight OpenClaw alternatives.
New KDE Plasma release with many upgrades.
And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
Humble Bundle has brought back the "Linux for Seasoned Admins" ebook bundle offer (partner link). From the classic Linux Pocket Guide and my favorite, Efficient Linux at the Command Line, the bundle also has ebooks on Docker, Ansible, Kubernetes and other devops aspects of Linux.
And your purchase also supports the Code for America initiative.
KDE Plasma 6.6 just landed with some practical upgrades. Spectacle now does OCR so you can pull text straight from screenshots, there's a new setup wizard for fresh installs, and WiFi QR code scanning works if you've got a camera.
Australia's cyber agency recently open-sourced Azul, a malware analysis platform for incident responders. It stores samples indefinitely, automates reverse engineering with reusable plugins, and clusters patterns across malware families.
App stores work great until you need real package control. This opinion piece by Roland argues Linux needs a modern Synaptic replacement for power users, but built with the Wayland security model in mind instead of running everything as root.
AI may not need your attention, but us humans do. YOUR support keeps us going. And it costs less than a McDonald's Happy Meal.
Opt for the Plus membership to:
✅ Get 5 FREE eBooks on Linux, Docker and Bash ✅ Enjoy an ad-free reading experience ✅ Flaunt badges in the comment section and forum ✅ To support creation of educational Linux materials
Our comprehensive guide to keyboard shortcuts in Linux Mint covers everything from basics like Super for the start menu and Ctrl+Alt+T for the terminal to workspace management, window tiling, screenshots, and session control.
Looking to replace your Linux desktop's default dock? We covered seven options ranging from lightweight Plank to the heavily customizable Latte and the old-school Cairo. Also includes a window manager-friendly pick like Tint2.
Linux distros are switching to Wayland by default, but legacy apps still need Xorg, so knowing which display server you're running matters when troubleshooting. A quick terminal command reveals whether you're on Wayland or X11.
echo $XDG_SESSION_TYPE
👷 AI, Homelab and Hardware Corner
OpenClaw's memory hunger kills it on Raspberry Pi and cheap SBCs. Here are some projects that remedy it by building an AI agent architecture for constrained hardware.
✨ Apps and Projects Highlights
To-do apps usually mine your data for ads. Super Productivity doesn't collect anything, just asks for notification access. It also offers Jira sync, Pomodoro timers, and time tracking.
In Linux Mint (Cinnamon desktop), you can right-click the title of a window and enable "Always on Top" and "Always on Visible Workspace". This ensures that the currently open window stays on your current workspace, and will be above every other app window.
You will also find this on other modern desktop environments like KDE Plasma and GNOME as well.
Canonical announce Ubuntu Pro for WSL, bringing extended security coverage to users running Linux on Windows. As on desktop, it's free for personal use.
Microsoft has released Coreutils for Windows, allowing a stack of familiar “Linux-like” command-line utilities to run natively on Windows. The project is based on uutils, the Rust-based reimplementation of GNU coreutils that Ubuntu (mostly) has adopted in recent releases. Microsoft’s package bundles uutils’ coreutils and findutils as well as a GNU-compatible grep in a single binary. It offers tools like cat, cp, ls, mv and uptime. Commands that use POSIX-only features are excluded, meaning chmod, chown, kill and others aren’t included. What’s notable – *nix tools working their way into the Windows ecosystem is notable – is that this isn’t […]
