Linux fréttir

Init system update arrives behind schedule while desktop overhaul adds app and HDR polish

There are fresh new releases of two of the more controversial and divisive projects in the Linux world for everyone to argue about… and then adopt anyway.…

Meanwhile Lotus Notes still lurks in some Office of National Statistics systems, for now

A flagship Office for National Statistics project to share data across the UK government appears to be ending several years before its time after failing to make enough progress, getting a "Red" risk rating two years in a row, and never appointing a program director.…

Reeves points finger at Moscow in interview when authorities reckon it's local lads

UK chancellor Rachel Reeves is blaming Moscow for Britain's latest cyber woes, an attribution that seems about as solid as wet cardboard given the trail of evidence pointing to attackers much closer to home.…

alternative_right shares a report from ScienceDaily: Scientists have developed a new multi-layered metalens design that could revolutionize portable optics in devices like phones, drones, and satellites. By stacking metamaterial layers instead of relying on a single one, the team overcame fundamental limits in focusing multiple wavelengths of light. Their algorithm-driven approach produced intricate nanostructures shaped like clovers, propellers, and squares, enabling improved performance, scalability, and polarization independence. [...] Mr Joshua Jordaan, from the Research School of Physics at the Australian National University and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Transformative Meta-Optical Systems (TMOS), said the ability to make metalenses to collect a lot of light will be a boon for future portable imaging systems. "The metalenses we have designed would be ideal for drones or earth-observation satellites, as we've tried to make them as small and light as possible," he said. The findings have been published in the journal Optics Express.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The corpse of Lotus Notes keeps twitching

Some software is more difficult to kill than a horror movie villain, it seems, as Domino and Notes versions 9.0.x and 10.0.x are now set to limp on until the end of this decade.…

Messy ruling details a perfect storm of NAO, MoD, and Aquila contract failures

Managed service provider Node4 has won a £2.4 million (c $3.2 million) damages award against the founder of Microsoft Dynamics consultancy Tisski, after the High Court ruled the company was sold with problematic contracts that were collapsing as the deal was being finalized.…

Stargates or black holes? Risks and rewards from the B(r)itbarn boom

Comment The UK has bitterly expensive power, an energy minister who sees electricity as bad, a lethargic planning system, and a grid with a backlog for connections running to 2039.…

NASA has unveiled 10 new astronaut candidates drawn from over 8,000 applicants. The diverse group includes four men and six women -- pilots, scientists, and medical professionals -- who will train for future missions to the ISS, the moon, and eventually Mars. CBS News reports: This is NASA's first astronaut class with more women than men. It includes six pilots with experience in high-performance aircraft, a biomedical engineer, an anesthesiologist, a geologist and a former SpaceX launch director. Among the new astronaut candidates is 39-year-old Anna Menon, a mother of two who flew to orbit in 2024 aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon as a private astronaut on a commercial, non-NASA flight. [...] The other members of the 2025 astronaut class are: - Army Chief Warrant Officer 3 Ben Bailey, 38, a graduate of the Naval Test Pilot School with more than 2,000 hours flying more than 30 different aircraft, including recent work with UH-60 Black Hawk and CH-47F Chinook helicopters. - Lauren Edgar, 40, who holds a Ph.D. in geology from the California Institute of Technology, with experience supporting NASA's Mars exploration rovers and, more recently, serving as a deputy principal investigator with NASA's Artemis 3 moon landing mission. - Air Force Maj. Adam Fuhrmann, 35, an Air Force Test Pilot School graduate with more than 2,100 hours flying F-16 and F-35 jets. He holds a master's degree in flight test engineering. - Air Force Maj. Cameron Jones, 35, another graduate of Air Force Test Pilot School as well as the Air Force Weapons School with more than 1,600 hours flying high-performance aircraft, spending most of his time flying the F-22 Raptor. - Yuri Kubo, 40, a former SpaceX launch director with a master's in electrical and computer engineering who also competed in ultimate frisbee contests. - Rebecca Lawler, 38, a former Navy P-3 Orion pilot and experimental test pilot with more than 2,800 hours of flight time, including stints flying a NOAA hurricane hunter aircraft. She was a Naval Academy graduate and was a test pilot for United Airlines at the time of her selection. - Imelda Muller, 34, a former undersea medical officer for the Navy with a medical degree from the University of Vermont's Robert Larner College of Medicine; she was completing her residency in anesthesia at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore at the time of her astronaut selection. - Navy Lt. Cmdr. Erin Overcash, 34, a Naval Test Pilot School graduate and an experienced F/A-18 and F/A-18F Super Hornet pilot with 249 aircraft carrier landings. She also trained with the USA Rugby Women's National Team. - Katherine Spies, 43, a former Marine Corps AH-1 attack helicopter pilot and a graduate of the Naval Test Pilot School with more than 2,000 hours flying time. She was director of flight test engineering for Gulfstream Aerospace Corp. at the time of her astronaut selection.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Names, emails unplugged in DCS support snafu – but 'billing is safe'

An electric vehicle charging point provider is telling users that their data may be compromised, following a recent security "incident" at a service provider.…

Cracks down on malicious pessimism and expressions of ennui

China’s Cyberspace Administration yesterday announced a two-month campaign to quash netizens who “maliciously incite negative emotions”.…

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: A new dark web portal to recruit spies for the UK was launched last Friday (19th September), as the UK steps up its commitment to national security. Harnessing the anonymity of the dark web for the first time, MI6's new secure messaging platform -- Silent Courier -- enables anyone, anywhere in the world with access to sensitive information relating to terrorism or hostile intelligence activity to securely contact the UK and offer their services. Instructions on how to access the portal will be publicly available on MI6's verified YouTube channel as the UK reaches out to potential new agents in Russia and around the world. MI6 advises individuals accessing its portal to use trustworthy VPNs and devices not linked to themselves, to mitigate risks which exist in some countries. The announcement was made by the outgoing Chief of MI6, Sir Richard Moore, in Istanbul where he stated that the platform will make it easier for MI6 to recruit agents online. As MI6 establishes its official presence on the dark web to reach new recruits and tackle hostile actors seeking to undermine UK security, Sir Richard said that the UK's intelligence services are "critical to calibrating risk and informing decisions" in navigating threats from hostile actors -- making platforms like these even more important in keeping our country safe. Sir Richard said: "Today we're asking those with sensitive information on global instability, international terrorism or hostile state intelligence activity to contact MI6 securely online. Our virtual door is open to you." Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said: "National security is the first duty of any government and the bedrock of the Prime Minister's Plan for Change. As the world changes, and the threats we're facing multiply, we must ensure the UK is always one step ahead of our adversaries. Our world class intelligence agencies are at the coalface of this challenge, working behind the scenes to keep British people safe. Now we're bolstering their efforts with cutting-edge tech so MI6 can recruit new spies for the UK - in Russia and around the world."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

China funded research could help video app's new American operators cut costs by 40 percent

Before Larry Ellison, Michael Dell and Rupert Murdoch put pen to paper to take over TikTok’s US operations from ByteDance, they might want to consider that one of the Chinese company’s network boffins thinks the app and others like it create “massive data wastage”.…

Longtime Slashdot reader hackingbear writes: The Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) has demonstrated its ability to launch and recover aircraft from its first electromagnetic catapult-equipped aircraft carrier, the CNS Fujian. Official imagery released by the PLAN today confirms that the new J-35 naval stealth fighters, KJ-600 airborne early warning and control aircraft, and J-15T fighter jet are carrying out carrier trials. Ben Lewis, a co-founder of PLATracker, told USNI News that the test was a "significant milestone" for the Chinese military's carrier program. "Once operational, the PLAN will have the capacity to field fifth-generation stealth carrier aircraft, supported by fixed-wing carrier-based airborne early warning and command aircraft, across the first island chain and Western Pacific Ocean," Lewis said. Electromagnetic catapults offer several advantages, not least the fact that they can be more finely tuned to very different aircraft types, including ones that are larger and slower (like the KJ-600), or which are smaller and lighter, such as smaller drones. In contrast to the U.S. Navy, which gathered decades of experience with steam-powered catapults, China opted for electromagnetic ones for its first catapult-equipped carrier. It's worth noting that the U.S. Navy's USS Gerald R. Ford was the first carrier ever to get an aircraft into the air using what is also referred to as an electromagnetic aircraft launch system (EMALS). However, it has not launched an F-35C so far, making the J-35 the first stealth jet to achieve this feat. Based on earlier predictions, the F-35C may not do the same for some years.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Supreme Court has temporarily allowed President Trump to fire Rebecca Slaughter, the last Democrat on the FTC. "The court's action is technically temporary, since the justices said they will hear arguments in the case in December, but every indication is that the conservative court majority will use the case to reverse a major Supreme Court precedent that dates back almost a century," reports NPR. From the report: Congress created the FTC and lots of other agencies to be multi-member, bipartisan regulatory agencies. And the Supreme Court in 1935 upheld those statutes ruling ruled against then-President Franklin D. Roosevelt's claim that he could fire FTC commissioners at will. In a unanimous opinion at the time, the court said Congress acted within its powers in declaring that a commissioner could only be fired for misconduct -- not for a policy disagreement. But now, prodded by President Trump, the court's six-member conservative majority seems poised to remake the way independent agencies operate. And if the handwriting on the wall is as clear as it seems to be, the independent agencies won't be independent. Their membership will be subject to the will of the president. The court's action Monday was hardly subtle. While the lower courts had ruled that the president could not fire Slaughter, under the court's 1935 precedent, the conservative Supreme Court majority allowed the president to fire her. Indeed, her name isn't even on the FTC website anymore. And the court so far has allowed Trump to fire other agency board members. In short, the justices are not playing hide-the-ball. And it's a good bet that the court will reverse the 1935 precedent, which until now had been reaffirmed multiple times. The result will be that whereas in the past, these agencies had to be bipartisan, with a minority of opposition party members, now there will be no such requirement. In short, Trump can name all the agency members. And if his successor is a Democrat, he or she can fire all the Republicans.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Signatories include 10 Nobel Prize winners

ai-pocalypse Ten Nobel Prize winners are among the more than 200 people who've signed a letter calling on the United Nations to define and enforce “red lines” that prohibit some uses of AI.…

The Moon is rusting -- and it's Earth's fault. Nature: Scientists have found that oxygen particles blown from Earth to the Moon can turn lunar minerals into hematite, also known as rust. The discovery adds to researchers' growing understanding of the deep interconnection between Earth and the Moon -- and shows how the Moon keeps a geological record of those interactions, says Ziliang Jin, a planetary scientist at Macau University of Science and Technology in China. He and his colleagues reported their findings earlier this month in Geophysical Research Letters. Most of the time, both Earth and the Moon are bathed in a stream of charged particles emanating from the Sun. But for around five days each month, Earth passes between the Sun and the Moon, blocking most of the flood of solar particles. During that time, the Moon is exposed mainly to particles that had been part of Earth's atmosphere before blowing into space -- a phenomenon known as Earth wind. That wind contains ions of various elements, including hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. When those charged particles hit the Moon, they can implant themselves into the upper layers of lunar soil and trigger chemical reactions.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Google is rolling out its Gemini AI assistant to Google TV, bringing conversational AI to over 300 million devices. Users will be able to ask Gemini for help with TV recommendations, show recaps, reviews, or even general tasks like homework help, vacation planning, or learning new skills. TechCrunch reports: The company stresses that Gemini's addition doesn't mean that you won't be able to do the same things you used to be able to do through the (non-AI) Google Assistant integration. Those commands will still work, says Google. The Gemini rollout to Google TV begins on the TCL QM9K series starting today. Later in the year, Gemini will arrive on the Google TV Streamer, Walmart onn 4K Pro, 2025 Hisense U7, U8, and UX models, and 2025 TCL QM7K, QM8K, and X11K models. More functionality will be added over time.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

iFixit's teardown of Apple's iPhone Air reveals a device dominated by its battery, which occupies approximately two-thirds of the internal space while critical components including the logic board cluster at the top. The battery matches the component used in Apple's iPhone Air MagSafe battery pack and can be swapped between devices. The top-heavy component layout addresses the bendgate vulnerability that damaged logic boards in previous thin iPhone models when pressure was applied to the device's middle section. Despite the iPhone Air's thinner profile, iFixit awarded it a 7 out of 10 repairability score, citing reduced component layering that provides more direct access to the USB-C connector, battery, and other serviceable parts compared to standard iPhone models. The dual-entry system further contributes to the device's serviceability.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Fortune: The dramatic rise in unemployment among Americans under 25 -- especially recent graduates -- has become one of the most troubling economic headlines of 2025. Recent insights from economists, central bankers, and labor market analysts signal that this appears to be a uniquely American challenge, underpinned by a "no hire, no fire" economy rather than solely by the rapid ascent of artificial intelligence. For many Gen Z workers, the struggle to land a job can feel isolating and fuel self-doubt. But that frustration recently got some high-level validation: Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell echoed economists' concerns about the cooling labor market, telling reporters at his regular press conference following the Federal Open Market Committee that it's an "interesting labor market" right now, adding that "kids coming out of college and younger people, minorities, are having a hard time finding jobs." Noting a low job finding rate, along with a low redundancy rate, he said, "you've got a low firing, low hiring environment." and noting that it's harder than ever for young jobseekers to break in. While recent months have been dubbed by Deutsche Bank "the summer AI turned ugly," and some major studies find AI adoption disrupting some entry-level roles, Powell was less sure. AI "may be part of the story," but he insisted the main drivers are a broadly slowed economy and hiring restraint. Top economists at Goldman Sachs and UBS tackled the subject soon after and found Powell to be mostly on the money. This isn't an AI story, at least not yet. "The U.S. labor market experience is peculiar," said Paul Donovan, UBS Chief Economist. "Young Euro area workers have a record low unemployment rate. In the UK, the young persons' unemployment rate has fallen steadily. Employment participation by young Japanese workers is near all-time highs. It seems highly implausible that AI uniquely hurts the employment prospects of younger US workers." "It might be tempting to blame technology... Machines, robots, or computers replacing humans is an ever-popular dystopian scenario." Donovan concludes that the U.S. pattern "more convincingly fits a broader hiring freeze narrative, affecting new entrants to the workforce." Goldman Sachs economist Pierfrancesco Mei said last Thursday that "finding a job takes longer in a low-turnover labor market." He argued that "job reallocation," or the pace at which new jobs are created and existing ones destroyed, has been on the decline since the late 1990s... "almost all the variation in turnover since the Great Recession mostly falls on younger workers" and is taking place as "churn." Goldman found that in 2019, it took a young unemployed worker about 10 weeks to find a new job in a low-churn state; now that's 12 weeks on average.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Misalignment risk? That's an area for future study

Google DeepMind added a new AI threat scenario - one where a model might try to prevent its operators from modifying it or shutting it down - to its AI safety document. It also included a new misuse risk, which it calls "harmful manipulation."…