News briefs for September 27, 2018.
System76 is launching a new open-source computer[1], which will be available for pre-order next month. Before announcing the finalized hardware, the company will be releasing a four-part animation each week with "design updates hidden within a game portion of the story". That story will contain "different worlds, each representing an antithesis to open source ideals. These themes are utilized to draw attention to the importance of open source in the evolution of technology". If you're interested, you can sign up here[2] to follow the saga and receive updates leading up to the pre-order.
Krita 4.1.3 was released today[3]. The team reports there are about 100 fixes, so update soon. This version features a new welcome screen, and several improvements, including working with selections and exporting EPUBs, and much more. Also, here's a reminder that Krita's Squash the Bugs[4] fundraiser is still live.
Fourteen new members have joined The Linux Foundation's Hyperledger[5] open-source blockchain project. According to the press release, new members include "BetaBlocks, Blockchain Educators, Cardstack, Constellation Labs, Elemential Labs, FedEx, Honeywell International Inc., KoreConX, Northstar Venture Technologies, Peer Ledger, Syncsort and Wanchain".
Google Project Zero researcher Jann Horn claims that distro maintainers need to merge kernel security fixes quicker. ZDNET quotes Horn regarding Debian and Ubuntu[6]: "Debian stable ships a kernel based on 4.9, but as of 2018-09-26, this kernel was last updated 2018-08-21. Similarly, Ubuntu 16.04 ships a kernel that was last updated 2018-08-27. Android only ships security updates once a month."
Java 11 is now available. There are several changes and updates with this release, so see the release notes[7] for all the changes. You can download it from here[8].
Jill Franklin is an editorial professional