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The Hot Take: GrapheneOS looks better more and more every day! Maybe I pay off my phone to move over to it now rather than later.
Sideloading on Android will get much harder for certain apps.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Linux is coming for Windows Gamers for sure!
Linux gamers are seeing massive performance gains with Wine's new NTSYNC support, "which is a feature that has been years in the making and rewrites how Wine handles one of the most performance-sensitive operations in modern gaming," reports XDA Developers. Not every game will see a night-and-day difference, but for the games that do benefit from these changes, "the improvements range from noticeable to absurd." Combined with improvements to Wayland, graphics, and compatibility, as well as a major WoW64 architecture overhaul, the release looks less like an incremental update and more like one of Wine's most important upgrades in years. From the report: The numbers are wild. In developer benchmarks, Dirt 3 went from 110.6 FPS to 860.7 FPS, which is an impressive 678% improvement. Resident Evil 2 jumped from 26 FPS to 77 FPS. Call of Juarez went from 99.8 FPS to 224.1 FPS. Tiny Tina's Wonderlands saw gains from 130 FPS to 360 FPS. As well, Call of Duty: Black Ops I is now actually playable on Linux, too. Those benchmarks compare Wine NTSYNC against upstream vanilla Wine, which means there's no fsync or esync either. Gamers who use fsync are not going to see such a leap in performance in most games. The games that benefit most from NTSYNC are the ones that were struggling before, such as titles with heavy multi-threaded workloads where the synchronization overhead was a genuine bottleneck. For those games, the difference is night and day. And unlike fsync, NTSYNC is in the mainline kernel, meaning you don't need any custom patches or out-of-tree modules for it work. Any distro shipping kernel 6.14 or later, which at this point includes Fedora 42, Ubuntu 25.04, and more recent releases, will support it. Valve has already added the NTSYNC kernel driver to SteamOS 3.7.20 beta, loading the module by default, and an unofficial Proton fork, Proton GE, already has it enabled. When Valve's official Proton rebases on Wine 11, every Steam Deck owner gets this for free. All of this is what makes NTSYNC such a big deal, as it's not simply a run-of-the-mill performance patch. Instead, it's something much bigger: this is the first time Wine's synchronization has been correct at the kernel level, implemented in the mainline Linux kernel, and available to everyone without jumping through hoops. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: This has me wanting to try this again on my pixel after i unlock it.
GrapheneOS, the privacy-focused Android fork, said in a post on X on Friday that it will not comply with emerging laws requiring operating systems to collect user age data at setup.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Linux appears to be getting more Rust by the day.
BrianFagioli writes: Canonical has joined the Rust Foundation as a Gold Member, signaling a deeper investment in the Rust programming language and its role in modern infrastructure. The company already maintains an up-to-date Rust toolchain for Ubuntu and has begun integrating Rust into parts of its stack, citing memory safety and reliability as key drivers. By joining at a higher tier, Canonical is not just adopting Rust but also stepping closer to its governance and long-term direction. The move also highlights ongoing tensions in Rust's ecosystem. While Rust can reduce entire classes of bugs, it often depends heavily on external crates, which can introduce complexity and auditing challenges, especially in enterprise environments. Canonical appears aware of that tradeoff and is positioning itself to influence how the ecosystem evolves, as Rust continues to gain traction across Linux and beyond. "As the publisher of Ubuntu, we understand the critical role systems software plays in modern infrastructure, and we see Rust as one of the most important tools for building it securely and reliably. Joining the Rust Foundation at the Gold level allows us to engage more directly in language and ecosystem governance, while continuing to improve the developer experience for Rust on Ubuntu," said Jon Seager, VP Engineering at Canonical. "Of particular interest to Canonical is the security story behind the Rust package registry, crates.io, and minimizing the number of potentially unknown dependencies required to implement core concerns such as async support, HTTP handling, and cryptography -- especially in regulated environments." Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: I wonder why given that Windows has gotten bashed for the lack of performance vs Linux.
Microsoft has blocked the registry trick that allowed Windows 11 users to enable a native NVMe driver on their PCs. However, third-party tools can still help with a workaround.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Windows getting beat up on Ai, bugs and privacy. I've been playing with the idea on Linux myself, when they keep ratcheting up the intrusiveness gets more enticing by the day.
Yes, Microsoft announced it's fixing common Windows 11 complaints. But what about getting rid of that requirement to have a Microsoft account before installing Windows 11? While Microsoft didn't mention that at all, the senior editor at the blog Windows Central reports there's "a number of people" internally pushing at Microsoft to relax that requirement: Microsoft Vice President and overall developer legend Scott Hanselman has posted on X in response to someone asking him about possibly relaxing the Microsoft account requirements, saying "Ya I hate that. Working on it...." [Hanselman made that remark Friday, to his 328,200 followers.] The blog notes "It would be very easy for Microsoft to remove this requirement from a technical perspective, it's just whether or not the company can agree to make the change that needs to be decided." Elsewhere on X someone told Hanselman they wanted to see Windows "cut out the borderline malware tactics we've seen in recent years to push things like Edge, Bing, ads into the start menu, etc." Hanselman's reply? "Yes a calmer and more chill OS with fewer upsells is a goal." Q: When will we see first changes? for now it's just words... Hanselman: This month and every month this year. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Only after weeks of articles about Linux gaming coming for your piece of the pie?
Microsoft has now confirmed itâs scaling back âupsellsâ (or ads/recommendations) in Windows 11 as part of its efforts to make the operating system a bit âcalmer.â On March 20, Microsoft announced a major update for Windows 11 that focuses on performance and quality-of-life improvements. Microsoft said itâs making File Explorer faster, moving the Start menu to WinUI 3 from React, adding an option to pause Windows updates for as long as you want, and even cutting back Copilot in apps like Notepad. The big release with the movable taskbar is being tested because Windows 11âs reputation has been at an all-time low for various reasons. For example, this yearâs first Windows update triggered BitLocker recovery, affected the performance of games, caused boot issues, and even crashed some PCs with a Black Screen of Death. However, these bugs arenât the only problem hurting Windows 11âs reputation. The primary reason is that the company has been adding Copilot to all areas of the OS, including the Start menu and even Notepad. The Copilotification of Windows has pushed back Microsoftâs loyal audience, including enterprises, and some upset users have coined the term âMicroslop.â Microsoft plans to reduce ads in Windows 11 The company is in damage-control mode, and itâs taking steps to win back Windows 11 usersâ trust, including plans to roll back the requirement for a Microsoft account during OOBE. That broader reset also appears to include Windows 11âs built-in promotions. As first spotted by Windows Latest, in a post on X, Scott Hanselman, one of the engineering leaders spearheading Windows fixes, said a âcalmer and more chill OS with fewer upsells is a goal,â which is one of the clearest signs yet that Microsoft is at least aware users are tired of being nudged toward its own services across the OS. Scottâs statement was in response to a userâs complaint that Microsoft employs âborderline malware tacticsâ to push things like Edge, Bing, and ads into the Start menu. And itâs actually true. For those unaware, Microsoft previously tried to show Bing Chat (now Copilot) pop-ups when it detected the default browser was Chrome. Bing pop-up ad in Google Chrome showing after some server-side update | Image Courtesy: WindowsLatest.com Microsoft also tried to automatically reset default browser settings and installed the Bing extension when you clicked on the Bing Chat pop-up. The pop-up was rolled back after outrage, but itâs just one of the many examples of how ads have ruined Windows. Thankfully, Microsoft is considering reducing these upsells, but it doesnât look like the ads will disappear entirely. âYes, a calmer and more chill OS with fewer upsells is a goal,â says Scott Hanselman, VP, Member of Technical Staff at MSFT. Itâs not a formal product announcement, but it does suggest the company wants Windows 11 to feel less noisy and less pushy. Windows 11 has an upsell problem Microsoft has a history of promoting its own products as âsuggestedâ apps in Windows 11, and those efforts have multiplied with Windows 11, where there are ads for Microsoft 365, OneDrive, and even Copilot during the first setup screen (OOBE). Likewise, if you use Chrome as your default browser, Microsoft often uses full-screen alerts to nudge you to use Edge instead. Itâs true that you can turn off some of these ads, including the âsuggestedâ apps in the Start menu from Settings > Personalization > Start, but I wouldnât call that a real solution. The real solution is simple: Windows shouldnât have ads because youâve paid for it when you bought the operating system or the device that came pre-installed with it. What do you think? Let me know in the comments below. The post Microsoft says itâll make Windows 11 a calmer OS with fewer upsells or ads, as it tries to win back users appeared first on Windows Latest
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: I would love this, brings back more privacy if you ask me.
Microsoft's big sweeping set of improvements coming soon to Windows 11 don't address its controversial Microsoft account requirements, but that might soon change.
Read the full articleThe Hot Take: Microsoft is just consuming Linux one bite at a time for sure...
Canonical has announced a collaboration with Microsoft to integrate Ubuntu Pro security features with Microsoft Defender, improving protection for enterprise Linux systems. This brings advanced threat detection and response tools into Ubuntu environments, giving organizations a more unified way to secure critical workloads across platforms. Linux is at the center of many enterprise systems, from cloud infrastructure to databases and transaction platforms, so tightening its security is a clear priority. Canonical connecting its Ubuntu Pro service directly with Microsoft Defender means firms running Ubuntu will be able to plug into Microsoftâs broader security ecosystem without needing to stitch separate tools⌠[Continue Reading]
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