Chrome is finally coming to ARM64 Linux devices this year, Google has announced. If you currently run Ubuntu (or another Linux distribution) on an ARM-based device like the Raspberry Pi or a Snapdragon X Elite laptop, etc, you’ve had no way to install an official Google Chrome build, only Chromium, the open-source project on which Chrome is … [Read more...]

Firefox’s new AI-powered ‘Smart Window’ feature is taking shape in development builds – I gave it a hands on in the latest v149.0b7 beta (on macOS). Although Firefox 148 added an AI Switch, Mozilla is all-in on AI in now it’s part of its double-bottom line and a way to generate money. Firefox’s upcoming Smart Window is … [Read more...]

Qualcomm subsidiary Arduino has announced the VENTUNO Q, a new single-board computer that ships with Ubuntu pre-installed. This isn’t a board aimed at casual makers or tech tinkerers bored with their Raspberry Pi, but catering to the demands of AI workloads at the edge: robotics, industrial automation, computer vision. The Ventuno Q is built … [Read more...]

A big update to Ghostty terminal emulator has dropped, delivering a raft of new features like scrollback search, native scrollbars and and process completion notifications. Ghostty 1.3.0 packs in 6 months of development effort: 2,800+ commits from 180 contributors. That means hundreds of performance tweaks, bug fixes and platform optimisations for … [Read more...]

HandBrake, the free and open-source video transcoder, has just dropped its first major release of 2026 – adding new professional encoders, MOV output container and a considered clutch of Linux changes. Those of you who work to production standards will find the DNxHR and ProRes encoder support in HandBrake 1.11.0 the star addition. Both offer a … [Read more...]

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 … [Read more...]

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 … [Read more...]

Ubuntu 26.04 LTS ships with two new extensions installed and active by default, both adding new search capabilities to the GNOME Shell Overview. The first new extension is Web Search Provider. This lets you initiate a web search on Google straight from the GNOME Shell Overview. ‘Initiate’ is the important term here as search terms made … [Read more...]

A new-look Firefox is on the way, with Mozilla designers working on a ‘Nova’ redesign that introduces more curves and colour. First reported by tech blogger Söeren Hentzschel, who published several internal design mockups, Nova gives Firefox a more rounded appearance: tabs and the address bar sport uniform radii, and sit in a segmented, … [Read more...]

Linux Mint is working on a redesigned screensaver and lock screen for the Cinnamon desktop. Based on our first look, it’s a solid improvement. If the word “screensaver” conjures flying star fields or photo slideshows, that’s fair, but in Cinnamon it also acts as the ‘screen locker’. In 2026, ‘saving’ … [Read more...]

If you take handwritten notes on Linux, chances are Xournal++ is something you’ve tried as its solid feature set and stylus support has earned it a loyal following amongst those who’d rather annotate PDFs or sketch equations than type. One criticism that follows it around is its interface. It’s rather pointer-led; lots of menus, … [Read more...]

Is the classic image meme dead, or buried under an avalanche of AI slop? Memerist, a new(ish) native meme generator for Linux, emerged on Flathub recently to help dig them out. Memerist is a native (GTK4/libadwaita) app for Linux desktop. It is technically an image editor with a focused set of features, geared to those who want a convenient, local … [Read more...]

GIMP 3.2 RC3 is now available for testing, giving users an opportunity to try the image editor’s upcoming features ahead of the stable release. As this is the third (and likely final) release candidate before GIMP 3.2 launches, the focus is on refinement. The developers say RC3 delivers “a number of bug fixes and final polishes”, … [Read more...]

February 2026 delivered a fresh batch of Linux app releases, with updates to VLC, GIMP, Vivaldi, and VirtualBox among the many that filtered out. I covered some of the month’s biggest releases with full-length features, including Firefox 148’s new AI ‘kill switch’, the ONLYOFFICE 9.3 and LibreOffice 26.2 productivity suite … [Read more...]

A new version of ONLYFFICE Desktop Editors, a open source office suite for Windows, macOS and Linux, is out with a fresh set of features and tools. ONLYOFFICE 9.3 adds more signature options for PDF forms, multipage view for documents, new solver tools and regex formulas in the spreadsheets and support for animated GIFs in presentation slides made … [Read more...]

Canonical’s engineers have announced the fourth and final monthly snapshot of Ubuntu 26.04, ahead of next month’s all important beta release. Ubuntu 26.04 Snapshot 4, like all other monthly snapshots, not a blessed build intended for mainstream usage. It’s a “throwaway artifact” that enables the distro’s … [Read more...]