Articles about Free Software

Mozilla has released Firefox 112.0 alongside Firefox ESR 102.10.0, the latest versions of its open-source, cross-platform browser.

Version 112 introduces performance improvements for those running Intel GPUs on Windows, plus makes it possible to restore the previous session using the Cmd/Ctrl + Shift + T shortcut.

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The Blender Foundation has unveiled Blender 3.5.0, the latest 3.x point release of its popular and powerful open-source, cross-platform 3D creation suite. The new release boasts several new features, including GPU-powered viewport compositor and vector displacement sculpting.

Blender 3.5’s main highlight, however, is that it builds massively on the curves-based hair system it introduced in version 3.3 with the addition of 'hair assets', 26 pre-built textures users can simply drag and drop on to existing models.

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Two months ago, the stable version of Kodi 20 'Nexus' arrived, bringing with it a wealth of new features to the hugely popular home theater software, including support for multiple instances of binary add-ons, AV1 Video support, and a massive rework of the subtitle system.

Today, the Kodi Foundation releases a new version, and Kodi 20.1 is well worth installing it as comes with an assortment of important bug fixes and some backports.

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A new report on the antivirus market from Security.org reveals that almost three-quarters of Americans still strongly believe computers need antivirus to protect their devices and 61 percent are relying on free options like Microsoft Defender.

The number relying on free solutions has held steady, down only one point since 2021. Interestingly, only eight percent of free antivirus users have experienced a breakthrough virus in the past year, compared to 10 percent of paid users.

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Primate Labs has unveiled a major new version of its cross-platform free benchmarking tool with the release of Geekbench 6.0.0 for desktop and mobile. The release comes more than three years after the last major update came out in September 2019.

Geekbench 6 has been engineered around how Primate Labs envisages computers and mobiles are being used in 2023. Its tests now include several new workloads, including the effects of blurring backgrounds in video conferencing streams, removing unwanted objects automatically from photos, and the use of scripting languages to analyze, process and convert text.

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Open-source BitTorrent client Transmission 4.0 has landed after over a year in development. Sporting over one thousands commits, the new release focuses on no fewer than four areas: resource efficiency, better community, code modernization and new features.

In terms of more efficient use of resources, Transmission 4.0’s code has been streamlined to fix poorly performing code and memory usage, with developers claiming 50 percent fewer CPU cycles and 70 percent fewer memory allocations are now used based on stress test benchmarking. In addition, payloads are smaller and bandwidth usage reduced.

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On schedule, The Document Foundation’s open-source, cross-platform office suite gains its first major point release of the year with LibreOffice 7.5. Version 7.5 unveils various design tweaks -- including a new application -- along with another long list of new and improved features right across the suite.

LibreOffice 7.5 opens with some design tweaks -- including "major improvements" to its dark mode support, which basically consist of over 40 bug fixes. There’s also new application and MIME-type icons, described as "more colorful and vibrant".

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Sober Lemur SRL has just released a major new version of its free and open-source PDF toolkit with the launch of PDFsam Basic 5.0 for Windows, macOS and Linux.

The application, which allows users to quickly and easily extract pages from PDFs as well as offering split, merge and rotate tools, gains a major facelift with the version 5 release, along with a brand new tool and several additions to existing features.

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Running Windows on Macs is nothing new, but with the loss of BootCamp support for the newer Silicon-based Macs (those running M1 and M2 chips), your only option for installing Windows is through virtualization software. You’ll find plenty of free and paid-for options available, so what makes UTM 4.1 stand out from a crowded field of virtualization tools?

When it comes to running Windows, UTM offers nothing you can’t find elsewhere in the form of Parallels Desktop, but there’s one crucial difference: UTM is open source and -- if you’re willing to update it manually -- completely free. If you want automatic updates, or you simply want to support the project, a one-time fee of $9.99 can be paid by purchasing UTM through the Mac App Store.

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The second and final Release Candidate for Kodi 20 'Nexus' was rolled out to testers a month ago and today the full, finished version arrives. This is the first release in a while that clears all known blockers, meaning it becomes available for all platforms.

Kodi 20.0 'Nexus' brings a wealth of changes, fixes and new features to the popular home theater software, including support for multiple instances of binary add-ons, AV1 Video support, and a massive rework of the subtitle system.

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Open source video broadcasting, recording and streaming tool OBS Studio 29.0 has been released for Windows, macOS and Linux.

With this release, the Windows build now supports AV1 encoding on both AMD (Radeon RX 7000 upwards) and Intel  (Arc Graphics) chipsets in addition to prior support for NVIDIA. Support on Linux is expected to follow in a future release.

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Kodi 20 -- codename 'Nexus' -- is the next version of the hugely popular home theater software. After several alpha releases the Kodi Foundation put out the first beta build -- Beta 1 -- last month.

For obvious reasons, alpha and beta releases aren’t ideal for use on a daily basis, but we have some good news -- the team has decided the software is now stable enough to not require a second beta release.

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Bartels Media GmbH has unveiled a major new version of its freemium cross-platform text expander tool with the launch of PhraseExpress 16 for Windows. The new release, which coincides with the software’s 20th anniversary, boasts a fresh new look, new trigger system, improved Edit History feature as well as a new unified phrase file format for using with Mac and iOS builds -- both of which are currently in beta.

The first major change sees the user interface updated with new high-resolution icons to match Windows 11’s more modernized look. Bartels is keen to highlight that the UI has been 'carefully updated' to ensure existing users aren’t left floundering looking for their favorite tools.

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Rick Brewster has announced the release of Paint.NET 5.0 (alpha). This early pre-release, which is also available as a portable build for existing users keen to try out the new features without affecting their current, stable release, promises significant performance increases, resurrected support for pressure-sensitive pens and tablets, plus a brand-new plugin system.

In addition, there are several new adjustments and effects, and a raft of improvements across existing tools. The new build does, however, jettison support for 32-bit systems and older versions of Windows.

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One of my favorite features on the Apple iPhone 14 Pro is the new Dynamic Island that replaces the old notch at the top of the screen. This, if you don’t know, is a dark island that expands and contracts (and even bubbles off) to show important alerts, notifications, and activities.

It’s a cool addition which Apple says, 'blurs the line between hardware and software'. And you can now add this feature to Windows. Here’s how.

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