Linux Weekly News

In April, the Gentoo Linux project banned the use of generative AI/ML tools due to copyright, ethical, and quality concerns. This means contributors cannot use tools like ChatGPT or GitHub Copilot to create content for the distribution such as code, documentation, bug reports, and forum posts. A proposal for Debian to adopt a similar policy revealed a distinct lack of love for those kinds of tools, though it would also seem few contributors support banning them outright.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (container-tools:4.0, container-tools:rhel8, git-lfs, glibc, libxml2, nodejs:18, and nodejs:20), Debian (dav1d and libpgjava), Fedora (kernel and pypy), Red Hat (glibc and nodejs:16), SUSE (ffmpeg, ffmpeg-4, ghostscript, go1.21, go1.22, less, python-python-jose, python-Werkzeug, and sssd), and Ubuntu (fossil, glib2.0, and libspreadsheet-parsexlsx-perl).

The extensible scheduler class (or "sched_ext") is a comprehensive framework that enables the implementation of CPU schedulers as a set of BPF programs that can be loaded at run time. Despite having attracted a fair amount of interest from the development community, sched_ext has run into considerable opposition and seems far from acceptance into the mainline. The posting by Tejun Heo of a new version of the sched_ext series at the beginning of May has restarted this long-running discussion, but it is not clear what the end result will be.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (ansible-core, avahi, bind, buildah, containernetworking-plugins, edk2, fence-agents, file, freeglut, freerdp, frr, git-lfs, gnutls, golang, grafana, grafana-pcp, gstreamer1-plugins-bad-free, gstreamer1-plugins-base, gstreamer1-plugins-good, harfbuzz, httpd, ipa, libjpeg-turbo, libnbd, LibRaw, libreswan, libsndfile, libssh, libtiff, libvirt, libX11, libXpm, mingw components, mingw-glib2, mingw-pixman, mod_http2, mod_jk and mod_proxy_cluster, motif, mutt, openssl and openssl-fips-provider, osbuild-composer, pam, pcp, perl, pmix, podman, python-jinja2, python-jwcrypto, python3.11, python3.11-cryptography, python3.11-urllib3, qemu-kvm, qt5-qtbase, runc, skopeo, sssd, systemd, tcpdump, tigervnc, toolbox, webkit2gtk3, xorg-x11-server, xorg-x11-server-Xwayland, and zziplib), CentOS (firefox, grub2, kernel, squid, thunderbird, tigervnc, and xorg-x11-server), Debian (chromium, glib2.0, python-idna, webkit2gtk, and wordpress), Fedora (freerdp, freerdp2, and pypy), Mageia (chromium-browser-stable, exfatprogs, freeglut, libtiff, libvirt, libxml2, openpmix, php-tcpdf, ruby, tpm2-tools, tpm2-tss, traceroute, and zziplib), Oracle (bind, buildah, git-lfs, gnutls, golang, grafana, grafana-pcp, libreswan, libvirt, libxml2, mod_http2, podman, python-jwcrypto, skopeo, sssd, and tigervnc), Red Hat (nodejs:18, nodejs:20, and squid:4), and SUSE (avahi, ghostscript, go1.21, go1.22, python-pymongo, python-Werkzeug, and sssd).

The LWN.net Weekly Edition for May 9, 2024 is available.

The so-called software supply chain starts with source code. But most security measures and tooling don't kick in until source is turned into an artifact—a source tarball, binary build, container image, or other method of delivering a release to users. The gittuf project is an attempt to provide a security layer for Git that can handle key management, enforce security policies for repositories, and guard against attacks at the version-control layer. At Open Source Summit North America (OSSNA), Aditya Sirish A Yelgundhalli and Billy Lynch presented an introduction to gittuf with an overview of its goals and status.

Fedora Magazine reports that the Fedora Asahi Remix for Apple Arm hardware, based on Fedora 40, is now available:

Fedora Asahi Remix offers KDE Plasma 6 as our flagship desktop experience. It also features a custom Calamares-based initial setup wizard. A GNOME variant is also available, featuring GNOME 46, with both desktop variants matching what Fedora Linux offers. Fedora Asahi Remix also provides a Fedora Server variant for server workloads and other types of headless deployments. Finally, we offer a Minimal image for users that wish to build their own experience from the ground up.

See the installation guide to get started with the Asahi Remix.

Security updates have been issued by Debian (glib2.0 and php7.3), Gentoo (Commons-BeanUtils, Epiphany, glibc, MariaDB, Node.js, NVIDIA Drivers, qtsvg, rsync, U-Boot tools, and ytnef), Oracle (kernel), Red Hat (git-lfs and kernel), SUSE (flatpak, less, python311, rpm, and sssd), and Ubuntu (libde265, libvirt, linux, linux-aws, linux-aws-5.4, linux-azure, linux-azure-5.4, linux-gcp, linux-gcp-5.4, linux-gkeop, linux-hwe-5.4, linux-ibm, linux-ibm-5.4, linux-iot, linux-kvm, linux-oracle, linux-oracle-5.4, linux-raspi, linux-raspi-5.4, linux-xilinx-zynqmp, linux, linux-azure, linux-azure-5.15, linux-azure-fde, linux-azure-fde-5.15, linux-gcp, linux-gcp-5.15, linux-gke, linux-gkeop, linux-gkeop-5.15, linux-ibm, linux-ibm-5.15, linux-kvm, linux-lowlatency, linux-lowlatency-hwe-5.15, linux-nvidia, linux-oracle, linux-oracle-5.15, linux-oem-6.5, and nghttp2).

A proposal to switch the default desktop for Fedora Workstation from GNOME to KDE Plasma largely went over like the proverbial lead balloon—unsurprisingly. But the conversation about the proposal did surface some areas where the distribution could perhaps be more inclusive with regard to the other desktop choices available. The project believes that it benefits from being opinionated and not requiring users to make multiple decisions before they can even install the distribution, but there is a balance to be found.

The systemd project is preparing for a new release. Version 256-rc1 was released on April 25 with a large number of changes and new features. Most of the changes relate to security, easier configuration, unprivileged access to system resources, or all three of these. Users of systemd will find setting up containers — even without root access — much simpler and more secure.

Version 14.1 of the GCC compiler suite has been released. The list of changes is long; it includes support for more C++26 features, preparation for Fortran 2023 support, a new -fhardened flag to enable security-hardening features, vectorizer improvements, and a number of static-analyzer improvements. See the release notes for details.

The Go Blog has a detailed article on the new, more secure random-number generator implemented for the 1.22 release.

For example, when Go 1.20 deprecated math/rand's Read, we heard from developers who discovered (thanks to tooling pointing out use of deprecated functionality) they had been using it in places where crypto/rand's Read was definitely needed, like generating key material. Using Go 1.20, that mistake is a serious security problem that merits a detailed investigation to understand the damage. Where were the keys used? How were the keys exposed? Were other random outputs exposed that might allow an attacker to derive the keys? And so on. Using Go 1.22, that mistake is just a mistake.

Security updates have been issued by Debian (kernel), Gentoo (libjpeg-turbo, xar, and Xpdf), Red Hat (bind, dhcp and glibc), and SUSE (bouncycastle, curl, flatpak, less, and xen).

The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has announced its annual impact report for 2023. The report includes updates from PSF staff as well as summaries of the foundation's activities, financials, and infrastructure. The PSF celebrated the 20th anniversary of PyCon US, distributed more than $370,000 in grants, and enjoyed impressive traffic on PyPI:

In 2023 PyPI saw a 45% growth in download counts and bandwidth alike, serving 603,378,275 downloads for the 516,402 projects hosted there requiring 747.4 Petabytes of data transfer, or 189.6 Gbps of bandwidth 24x7x365.

See the full report for a breakdown of grant disbursements and trends, PSF expenses, and high-level plans for the rest of 2024.

Daniel Stenberg has posted a report about the recent curl up conference about curl development. It was held over two days in Stockholm. The report has short summaries of the talks with links to the recordings.

curl up is never a big meeting/conference but we have in the past sometimes been around twenty-five attendees. This year's amount of fifteen was the smallest so far, but in this small set of people we have a set of long-term well-known curl contributors. It is not a big list of attendees that creates a good curl up.

In some aspects, such as in gaming, the Linux desktop has made enormous strides in the past few years. In others, such as accessibility, things have stagnated. At Open Source Summit North America (OSSNA), Matt Campbell spoke about the need for, and an approach to, modernizing accessibility for desktop Linux. This included a discussion of Newton, a fledgling project that may greatly improve accessibility on the Linux desktop.

The Free Software Foundation has announced the recipients of its 2023 Free Software Awards: Bruno Haible for work on gnulib, Nick Logozzo as the "outstanding new free software contributior", and code.gouv.fr for projects of social benefit.

When presenting the award to Haible, FSF executive director Zoë Kooyman commented on the significance of Haible's work, saying that Haible's work enabled free software programmers around the world to focus on the main, innovative portions of their program, thus facilitating the development of more and more free software.

Security updates have been issued by Debian (glibc, intel-microcode, less, libkf5ksieve, and ruby3.1), Fedora (chromium, gdcm, httpd, and stalld), Gentoo (Apache Commons BCEL, borgmatic, Dalli, firefox, HTMLDOC, ImageMagick, MediaInfo, MediaInfoLib, MIT krb5, MPlayer, mujs, Pillow, Python, PyPy3, QtWebEngine, Setuptools, strongSwan, and systemd), Oracle (grub2 and shim), Red Hat (git-lfs, kpatch-patch, unbound, and varnish), and SUSE (avahi, grafana and mybatis, java-11-openjdk, java-17-openjdk, skopeo, SUSE Manager Client Tools, SUSE Manager Salt Bundle, and SUSE Manager Server 4.3).

The 6.9-rc7 kernel prepatch is out for testing. "The stats for 6.9 continue to look very normal, and nothing looks particularly alarming."

Kernel developers are encouraged to send their changes in small batches as a way of making life easier for reviewers. So when a longtime developer and maintainer hits the list with a 437-patch series touching 859 files, eyebrows are certain to head skyward. Specifically, this series from Jens Axboe is cleaning up one of the core abstractions that has been part of the Linux kernel almost since the beginning; authors of device drivers (among others) will have to take note.