Software

Hailing from Germany and based on Arch Linux, Bluestar is a distro that comes in three editions (Desktop, Deskpro, and Developer) and has just been updated to version 6.11.3. The list of changes consists mostly of updated packages, as well as a series of tweaks and fixes.

MIT researchers have created the Future You web service where young users can chat with 60-year-old AI-versions of themselves. Wallowing Gen Zs and Alphas can improve their well-being by talking to themselves, which would have been a crazy idea in the past, but not with the effective AI simulacrums.

Stardock announces the release of its Multiplicity 4 software KVM to turn spare laptops into monitors and control mutliple PCs with one keyboard and mouse. The software can help improve gaming rig performance by remote-controlling secondary PCs where non-essential apps have been moved to.

Google is looking to offer a native Terminal app for Android, possibly with Android 16. The Terminal app will allow installation of a Linux VM with full GUI and GPU acceleration along with other sysadmin features including disk resizing, port forwarding, and partition recovery. This is an extension of Google's earlier project of allowing Chrome OS to run on Android using the Android Virtualization Framework.

The Epic Games Store offers new free games each week, but accessing these titles on the Steam Deck requires a third-party launcher. Installing these third-party tools often requires extra steps, but it seems that will change soon as the Junk Store app is coming to the official Steam store

Microsoft continues to improve Windows 11 by rolling out fresh new features. A notable recent addition that is currently being tested is the "Copy as Table" feature in the Snipping Tool which enhances its existing optical character recognition (OCR) capabilities.

The paid PoGoskill app makes it possible to trick Pokémon GO into believing the user is going places without ever leaving their couch, thus eliminating the legwork needed to collect virtual Pokémon.

It looks like the popularity of the Lenovo Legion Go, Asus ROG Ally, and their stablemates has finally forces Microsoft to realise that gaming handhelds are here to stay. In the latest Windows Insider Preview, Microsoft has added a new on-screen game keyboard that uses an optimised layout and a mixture of touch and controller input to increase typing speed.

The excruciatingly long road to the release of GIMP 3.0, along with its revolutionary new non-destructive editing features, is finally drawing to a close. The GIMP development team has announced that it only has eight bugs reports left to resolve before the first release candidate goes live.

Steam recently updated its store checkout page to clarify that gamers are buying licenses for games, instead of the games themselves — along with all the content removal and malarkey that accompany these distribution strategies. GOG sarcastically responded to Steam's new storefront disclaimer, reminding us that GOG's offline installers "cannot be taken away from you."

Yesterday, Ubuntu 24.10 finally came out of beta. Codenamed "Oracular Oriole," it sports the latest kernel (version 6.11), expanded toolchains with versioned Rust and Java TCK, tighter security controls via improved permissions prompting, GNOME 47, support for OpenVEX and OSV vulnerability reporting, and more.

It looks like Microsoft's Recall push is back in full swing with Windows 24H2. A recent technical analysis revealed that disabling Recall also disables the modern File Explorer interface. Currently, it is unclear whether this is a bug or intended behaviour, but it's indicative of Microsoft's AI-encrusted future.

A new stable update has landed for all of Garmin's recent Forerunner smartwatches. Rolling out now globally, the update is said to resolve one area that could have caused issues in some cases on older software.

Garmin has finally released a massive update for the Enduro 3, Fenix E and Fenix 8 that it has been teasing on its Beta Program for weeks. Rolling out now as System Software 11.89, the update contains a whopping fifty changes, including almost a dozen new features.

Released yesterday, Ubuntu Budgie 24.10 will receive nine months of support. This update focuses on refining the Budgie desktop while paving the way for Wayland. Consequently, the developers removed the X11 plank dock, defaulted the top bar to a dark theme, and added support for Apple HEIF image files.

Adobe has killed perpetual licenses for its Elements software lineup with the launch of Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements 2025. After three years of use, users will be blocked from launching and using the Elements 2025 software. The 2025 software adds more features and Apple M3 CPU support.

The X200 series is currently touted to comprise the most modern (as in, most iPhone-like) flagship smartphones released by Vivo to date very soon. Now, the version of Android with which they will hope to take iOS on has been previewed on Weibo. OriginOS 5 is now slated to debut with its own version of the Dynamic Island, Google Gemini and Circle to Search.

In an unusual turn of events, Garmin has started rolling out a fresh batch of updates for some of its older mid-range smartwatches. Arriving as a beta update for now, the same firmware should soon reach all eligible models as a new stable build.

Google's Imagen 3 was initially available through the company's AI Test Kitchen in the US, but starting today, all Gemini users can access the text-to-image model. Google says the new AI image generator model can offer more photorealism and produce fewer artifacts than its predecessor.

Garmin's latest smartwatch releases have received another new update. This time, it seems that the company is preparing to issue a more substantial stable update, which will follow on from Beta Version 11.88 if all is well.

Apple has announced the Swift Student Challenge 2025 for student programmers to showcase their app ingenuity to win prizes from Apple. Fifty distinguished winners will spend three days at Apple HQ networking with peers and meeting Apple staff.

WhatsApp users looking for an alternative to Meta AI now have the power of Microsoft Copilot at their fingertips that can be harnessed just by typing a query into a WhatsApp chat.

Turkey has now banned Discord after they denied the authorities' request to share private user information. The court decision was caused by "child sexual abuse and obscenity" suspicions pointing at some users of the platform. The ban comes shortly after Discord was blocked in Russia, but for different reasons.

The Volkswagen Tayron has now been introduced to the European market as a more premium SUV than the Tiguan thanks to its seven-seat layout. It has diesel, petrol and mild hybrid variants as well as two eHybrid options with an estimated range of 100 kilometers (km, or ~62 miles). The Tayron also boasts a 32-centimeter (~12.6-inch) infotainment screen and light-up badges.

Boasting AI features and a focus on privacy and security, Gnoppix comes in both a community-supported free version (Core) and a Pro flavor that includes several premium features for a moderate fee. Based on Debian and Kali Linux, Gnoppix 24.10 comes with multiple updated packages, as well as various tweaks and fixes.

Samsung has recently confirmed that the One UI 7 update will land alongside the Galaxy S25 series next year. There were some concerns about public beta availability, which Samsung has now cleared up.

It looks like the promised SteamOS ISO release is closer than we might have thought. Valve's Gamescope microcompositor recently received support for the Asus ROG Ally and Ally X displays and making them fully compatible with the SteamOS overlay and refresh rate slider.

The 24H2 update for Windows 11 is now being rolled out, and some users are encountering a frustrating bug causing the cursor to disappear in certain scenarios. Thankfully, an easy way of dealing with the issue has already been discovered.

Succeeding the now ancient Microsoft Write, which was released in 1985, WordPad arrived with Windows 95 almost three decades ago. Sadly, Windows 11 24H2 will remove this app once it gets installed, and no successor is planned. In the future, Microsoft suggests users to replace WordPad with Notepad or Word, but those who want can keep using it.

A Chinese state-sponsored hacking group, Salt Typhoon, breached major U.S. broadband providers' networks, posing a huge national security threat by potentially accessing systems used for lawful wiretapping. Investigations are ongoing into the extent of the breach.

The 57th release of the open-source, security-focused OpenBSD operating system is now available and carries the 7.6 version label. Its highlights include support for the Milk-V Pioneer board and Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processor, multiple tweaks and fixes, improved video acceleration support, and more.

Garmin has started rolling out a new stable update to all of its recent Forerunner smartwatches, including the recent Forerunner 165. Available to download now, the new update should bring a few new bug fixes to the Forerunner 265 and Forerunner 965 as well, including one that should prevent a crash when starting a new activity.

Meta has unveiled Movie Gen, an AI that can create and edit videos with music and sound effects using text prompts. Meta researchers suggest its AI is state-of-the-art in its video and audio generation capabilities. The AI can animate a person from one photograph, replace any object with another, and create professional soundtracks and sound effects.

Lorex promises particularly high-res 360-degree in-home surveillance with its latest security camera, as it has 2 lenses and both are rated for 2K recording. The new pan-tilt (PT) model also has a prominent One-Touch button so that the user can immediately connect with a responsible account-holder and a "Smart" band of LEDs for notification alerts or ambient lighting.

Garmin has delivered yet another update for its latest flagship smartwatches. While the Enduro 3, Fenix E and Fenix 8 have only been around since late August, Garmin has now introduced over sixty improvements across multiple beta updates.

Samsung is rolling out a new security update for the Galaxy S24 FE, aimed at device security. The October 2024 patch is slowly becoming available in Asia and Africa, with a global rollout expected soon.

Samsung has ported the Tizen OS to the open-source RISC-V CPU architecture. This brings developers one step closer to releasing Tizen smart devices on royalty-free CPUs. The company joined the RISE (RISC-V Software Ecosystem) open-software development project in 2023.

Automatic floor cleaners are one of the most popular and widespread form of household robots right now. However, they come with potential privacy issues that are much less desirable, according to a smart home security researcher. One particular robot vacuum located in Australia reportedly contains vulnerabilities that allow attackers to hijack its camera and speakers completely wirelessly and remotely.

Numerous Samsung smartphones are currently affected by a major software error that is rendering them unusable. There are ways to prevent the error from occurring and also ways to fix it.

Among its announcement at its annual developer conference, Samsung revealed its plan to adopt a single name for the software powering all its consumer products. This follows a similar pattern adopted by Huawei and Xiaomi with HarmonyOS and HyperOS respectively.

Known as either Windows 11 24H2 or Windows 11 2024, the latest feature update to Microsoft's popular operating system is already rolling out to compatible devices. However, there are two areas of focus, namely for AI and non-AI devices. The list of common changes includes improved energy saving, Wi-Fi 7 and HDR background support, and more.

Garmin has started rolling out a fresh stable update for the Fenix 7 and Fenix 7 Pro, which is also available for the Enduro 2, Epix 2, MARQ Gen 2 and Quatix 7. According to Garmin, Software Version 18.16 contains over half a dozen changes, including two aimed at resolving bugs that could cause system crashes.

Lately, government agencies have been cracking down on privacy-oriented messaging services, leaving many with a sense of uncertainty surrounding their online privacy. Fortunately, SimpleX Chat has taken to solving this issue, and in his latest video, Mental Outlaw explores the unique privacy features that set SimpleX Chat apart.

Qualcomm and Epic Games are transforming in-car experiences by integrating Unreal Engine into the Snapdragon Cockpit Platform, which will let automakers deliver personalized, immersive, and intelligent digital environments inside vehicles.

Gigabyte aims to blend traditional arcade-style gaming with generative AI as part of the Brand Day events held in partnership with Canada Computers. The experience is rated to allow users to engage in competitive image generation at one of three Tournaments to be held between now and the end of December 2024.

Google has been advocating RCS messaging for a while, but no Wear OS smartwatch is compatible yet, not even the LTE variants. However, as the APK teardown of a new Google Messages beta suggests, standalone RCS messaging could soon be introduced to these smartwatches.

Microsoft Office 2024 is the latest version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, etc., that does not require a subscription and is available for both Windows and macOS. Microsoft has given the Office apps a fresh design and a range of new features.

Unleashed yesterday alongside a refreshed Nvidia app that sports RTX HDR multi-monitor support, the 565.90 GeForce Game Ready Driver software package focuses on three games, namely MechWarrior 5: Clans, Throne and Liberty, and Starship Troopers: Extermination. The update also sports optimal settings for three titles and several fixes.

Developer Gabriel Chua has released his answer to Google's increasingly popular PDF to podcast converter notebookLM. Open NotebookLM replicates Google's capabilities by combining various open-source models.