OpenAI has announced a preview release of the official ChatGPT Desktop app for Linux. Compared to using ChatGPT in a browser tab, the GUI desktop app can run Codex in your local repos, hook into and control other apps via extensions, handle ChatGPT Work-related tasks and probe your local files without you having to upload things elsewhere. In an email, OpenAI said that ‘Linux has been one of the most-requested platforms’ for its desktop app, and with this launch it’s finally available on all major operating systems. ChatGPT desktop app for Linux joins Anthropic’s Claude desktop app for Linux, which entered […]

You're reading ChatGPT desktop app is now available for Linux (in preview), a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Mozilla has released Firefox 153 with built-in containers, QR code generation and more quick actions in the address bar. This is the final “monthly” stable release before Mozilla moves to a faster release cadence, putting out new stable versions of Firefox every two weeks. On an unrelated note, Firefox has decided to resume activity on X (formerly Twitter) after a year of no activity. Like all updates, you can get this one for Windows, macOS and Linux, as well as for Android and iOS (mobile versions have different features and are not covered in this post). Containers now enabled by […]

You're reading Firefox 153 enables containers, GTK rounded corners by default, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

The official Discord desktop app supports Linux but it doesn’t make much effort to fit in, which is why alternative clients are popular – not least because they can be themed. Discord GNOME Theme by developer ~ricewind012, is so named because, basically, that’s what it is: a custom theme that restyles Discord to look more like Adwaita and follow the GNOME HIG (well, as close as Discord’s CSS allows). A reminder: Ubuntu’s Yaru theme is based (heavily) on upstream Adwaita, so while this theme won’t give an exact match on Ubuntu, it’s closer than stock. As it’s all CSS, it […]

You're reading This theme makes Discord look more at home on Ubuntu, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

When Flathub banned AI-coded app submissions last month, some critics warned the platform was denying the future by dismissing a new wave of “vibe-coded” software as out-and-out “slop”. Well, new data suggests otherwise, as nearly three-quarters of the rejected apps are already dead, existing only a few months. Linux developer Evangelos Paterakis, developer of Tuba, Turntable and others, did the digging, looking at 120 code repositories whose pull requests for inclusion on Flathub were rejected because of their heavy AI usage and given an “AI Slop” tag. Of those rejected, 88 are no longer under active development, many having deleted their […]

You're reading Flathub’s AI slop ban looks like it was the right call, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Anthropic has released a beta of its Claude desktop app for Linux, launching alongside an apt repo Ubuntu users can add for ongoing updates. According to the official docs, Claude desktop for Linux offers “the same Chat, Cowork, and Claude Code experience as macOS and Windows: parallel sessions, visual diff review, an integrated terminal and editor, and live app preview”. However, not all of the app’s features are yet available. The Linux beta lacks Computer Use, which lets Claude control apps directly, and voice dictation, both present on macOS and Windows. Anthropic says Computer Use support is coming to Linux […]

You're reading Claude desktop app for Linux enters beta – here’s how to try it, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

If you installed Ubuntu 26.04 LTS and noticed video and music files weren’t showing image thumbnails in the file manager, a packaging oversight was to blame, not anything you did. It turns out that Ubuntu’s Default install option (aka minimal install) wasn’t pulling in the gst-audio-thumbnailer and gst-video-thumbnailer packages which generate media thumbnails when you open a folder full of compatible files. A metapackage doesn’t contain software itself, just a list of the packages that need to be installed for, in this case, an Ubuntu desktop experience. Confusingly, both thumbnailers were present in the full install’s meta file, so if […]

You're reading Ubuntu 26.04 LTS has fixed its missing video/audio thumbnails, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Ubuntu is working on speech-to-text AI transcription so you can talk to type. It's powered by project Myna. Here's how it'll work and why it's adding it.

You're reading Ubuntu’s new ‘Myna’ AI offers voice typing – but how?, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

BudsLink is a Linux app giving you more control over Bluetooth earbuds from the likes of Apple, Sony, Samsung and Nothing – battery levels, active noise cancellation (ANC) and more, all without needing to use a mobile app. Most Bluetooth audio devices ‘just work’ on Ubuntu and other Linux distributions for listening to audio, but that’s about it. Pair AirPods or Galaxy Buds with your desktop and you’ll find you can’t adjust all of the on-device features you paid for. BudsLink is a GTK4/libadwaita app which can. It lets you control earbud features on your Linux desktop, no need to […]

You're reading Control AirPods & Galaxy Buds on Ubuntu with ‘BudsLink’, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Ever wished you could talk in to a text field rather than type? Ubuntu 26.10 hears you – quite literally. Canonical’s VP of Engineer Jon Seager, at the Ubuntu Summit, said the distro will soon lets users “press a button and talk into any field that you could previously type in”. A small, on-device AI language parsing model like Whisper will power the feature. It’s part of a wider push to integrate AI features in Ubuntu this year, with founder Mark Shuttleworth aiming to position Ubuntu as the ‘OS for agentic AI’. AI features in Ubuntu will be shipped as […]

You're reading Ubuntu is adding AI-powered voice input to all text fields, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

You’ll have to sift through fewer vibe-coded apps on Flathub in future, as the store has announced a policy change on software made using AI tools. Flathub, the de-facto place to find and install Flatpak applications, is banning the use of “AI” coded applications and automated submissions going forward. It’s not a blanket ban – mature projects with AI code are allowed A change to the store’s policy note says “applications containing AI-generated or AI-assisted code, documentation, or other content are not allowed”. A carve out will allow “mature, well-maintained projects” to include AI generated code and use AI tools […]

You're reading Flathub bans AI-coded apps – with some exceptions, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Daily builds of Ubuntu 26.10 ‘Stonking Stingray’ are now available for download, as development on the distro’s next major release kicks in to gear. As the name suggests, new ISOs are produced from development code on a (mostly) daily basis, giving those keen to test October’s release in advance the ability to do so. However, because package updates can break the ability for a bootable image to be created, it’s not unusual for there to be temporary gaps between new daily builds being available. Daily builds will continue to be produced for remainder of the Ubuntu 26.10 development cycle, right […]

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AI features are coming to Ubuntu in 2026, though Canonical has made clear that the distro is not becoming an AI product. In a community post, Jon Seager, VP of engineering at Canonical, says the company is “ramping up its use of AI tools in a focused and principled manner” this year, with a bias toward local inference and open-weight models whose licence terms match Canonical’s values. AI features in Ubuntu will take one of two forms. Implicit features improve existing capabilities using on-device AI models, for things like text-to-speech and speech-to-text to bolster accessibility. Ubuntu will become a context-aware […]

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Your mouth can (probably) say things quicker than your hands can type them, yet voice typing is rarely used as a primary input method on desktop, despite most of us thinking nothing of using it on mobile. That’s despite speech-to-text being available on desktop OSes for decades, natively and through dedicated apps. It never caught on because it was inaccurate and slow and typically hidden away as an assistive feature. (And because a lot of what you do at a keyboard is navigation and that is less efficient to speak, unless ‘arrow down, arrow down, arrow down’ is some trendy […]

You're reading Type with your voice on Linux using this Whisper-based app, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Thunderbolt is a new open source AI client from the Mozilla-owned MZLA Technologies aimed at enterprises who want to run self-hosted chatbots on their own infrastructure. MZLA Technologies is the for-profit subsidiary of the Mozilla Foundation that develops and maintains the Thunderbird email client. It says Thunderbolt was created with the support of a grant from Mozilla. Terrible name aside (Intel owns a trademark for ‘Thunderbolt’ which Apple markets heavily, so it’s not the best choice for clarity), the LLM that MZLA Technologies asked to write their press release says that Thunderbolt is a “sovereign AI client” for organisations who want their own AI infrastructure. […]

You're reading Thunderbolt is an open-source ‘AI client’ from Mozilla’s for-profit arm, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Several Intel NPU fixes land in the latest update to Resources, which Ubuntu is making the default system monitor in 26.04 LTS. Resources is a GTK4/libadwaita tool that shows more system usage, processes and hardware details than GNOME System Monitor, which it is replacing as Ubuntu’s default in the new LTS. The Resources v1.10 release at the start of February added (among other changes) support for AMD Neural Processing Units (NPUs). The app has supported usage for Intel NPUs since its v1.7.x release in late 2024. The v1.10.2 changelog resolves what is described as “implausible” usage values in Intel NPU […]

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Pigeon Email Notifier is a GNOME Shell extension that does one thing: show a desktop notification when new mail arrives in your Gmail, Microsoft Outlook or IMAP webmail account. If you don’t want to leave a webmail tab open in Firefox, the overhead of a desktop email app like Thunderbird, or your provider doesn’t offer a desktop Linux app (like Fastmail and Proton Mail now do), Pigeon provides a set-and-forget way to still get new mail alerts. Desktop email notifiers have been around for a long time. I’ve written about many standalone tools, like Unity Mail, Popper and Mail Nag over […]

You're reading Get Gmail alerts on Ubuntu without a dedicated mail client, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.

Ubuntu 26.04 will show asterisks when you type your sudo password, as Canonical adds a patch to its Rust-based sudo-rs. Here's what changed and why.

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The Firefox 148 update sees its stable release today, bringing with it a much-request ‘AI kill switch’ to easily disable all AI-powered features within the browser. Mozilla has said future updates to the browser will not re-enable AI features once disabled. Given that Mozilla now measures its success by how much revenue it makes from AI features in its products, Firefox included, that’s a reassuring stance. To disable AI features in Firefox go to Settings > AI Controls. Slide the ‘Block AI Enhancements’ toggle to turn off ChatGPT and other chatbots in the sidebar, AI link previews, the (supposedly) smart […]

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JetBrains confirms native Wayland support for IntelliJ IDEs starting in 2026.1. The move from X11 improves scaling and performance for Linux developers.

You're reading JetBrains enables Wayland support by default in IntelliJ 2026.1, a blog post from OMG! Ubuntu. Do not reproduce elsewhere without permission.