ConnexionAmarok 3.0 Released, Ported to Qt5/KDE Frameworks 5
A new version of the open-source music player Amarok has been released, the first major update to the Qt-based media app since 2018. Amarok 3.0 is the first stable release to use Qt 5 and KDE Frameworks 5, and work to port the music player to the the newest Qt 6 and KDE Frameworks 6 is, its devs say, soon to get underway. “Common usecases should work quite well, and in addition to fixing KF5 port related regressions reported in pre-releases, 3.0 features many bugfixes and implemented features for longstanding issues, the oldest such documented being from 2009,” devs say. […]
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A new version of Clapper, a GTK4-based video player for Linux desktop has been released — the first major update in nearly 2 years. I first wrote about Clapper back in 2021 having been seduced over by its slick user interface (a superficial reason to like a media player, I know), its use of GStreamer, and a small but focused feature set that wasn’t trying to distract me with features I’d never need. Subsequent updates to the app refined and expanded those selling points further and player remained my preferred video player, despite the lack of any major update since […]
A new version of Audacity, a popular open-source audio workstation, is available to download. Audacity 3.5 introduces major new features and improvements, fixes a number of issues in earlier builds, and removes a number of older, less-used options. The headline addition is sure to be the new cloud-saving feature. This allows users to save Audacity projects to the audio.com website (requires a signup), permitting projects to be accessed from different devices, and enabling sharing and collaboration. And, arguably more important, it acts as a versioned backup. If something goes wrong with a project you can restore an earlier version — […]
You know the drill by now: a new month rolls around, and a new version of the inimitable Mozilla Firefox rolls off the release server for us all to enjoy. And bang on cue, Firefox 125 has arrived. The big-ticket new feature in this update is URL paste suggestions: Mozilla says this feature “provides a convenient way for users to quickly visit URLs copied to the clipboard in the address bar of Firefox.” How does it work? If you copy a URL to the system clipboard and then focus the URL bar (in Firefox 125, that is) you will see […]
If you want to relax or need to concentrate on a task at your computer then listening to ambient sounds can often help — and the best Linux app for this task just got a big update! Blanket is a free, open-source GTK4/libadwaita app that comes packaged with a variety of ambient looping sounds. These range from classic nature tracks (rain, wind, waves, birds, etc) through to environmental buzz (coffee shop, city, train, etc). You can play just a single sound or layer several sounds simultaneously by adjusting the volume level for each preset individually so everything sits right aurally. […]
A big update to Extension Manager, a popular 3rd-party tool to browse, install, and manage GNOME Shell extensions without the need for a web browser, has been released. If you’re into customising Ubuntu, be it changing the look and layout, adding animated effects, patching in new features and capabilities, or modifying underlying behaviour, you’ll know that GNOME Shell extensions are essential — as is this terrific, user-friendly tool. Extension Manager 0.5 is described as a “Performance & Polish” release by its developer Matt Wakeman, and with an update to libadwaita 1.5, smarter adaptive behaviour, (much needed) search fixes, and other […]
Mozilla Firefox 124 is now officially available to download. The latest update to the open-source web browser includes a small clutch of improvements. Firefox View can now sort open tabs by recent activity (default) or tab order making it a touch faster to find specific tabs using this feature; and Firefox’s built-in PDF viewer now supports caret browsing mode for improved accessibility. The Firefox snap package for Ubuntu saw a regression in native messaging portal support (used by some web extensions, including the GNOME Shell extensions doohickey) in the Firefox 122 release. It took some time by the bug is […]
A new version of CrossOver is out building out from last month’s release of Wine 9.0. Created by CodeWeavers, a major contributor to Wine’s ongoing development, CrossOver is a commercial version of Wine with extra “goodies” included that make running Windows games and apps on Linux, Chrome OS and macOS desktops a little bit easier. CrossOver 24 is the latest release and the first based on Wine 9.0 (itself a huge update with over 7,000 changes). Also included are Wine Mono 8.1.0, vkd3d 1.10, and MoltenVK 1.2.5 to ensure solid performance across the multiple different operating systems supported. CodeWeavers devs […]
A new stable version of the Mozilla Firefox web browser is available to download. Mozilla Firefox 123 buffs the browser’s privacy-respecting translation feature. Now when you translate a web page the browser also translates text shown in tooltips (i.e. titles) and any placeholder text shown in form controls/fields/search boxes. Address bar settings are now listed in the Settings > Search section. From here you can choose the kinds of results the address bar ‘suggests’ for queries you enter, e.g., browsing history, bookmarks, open tabs, shortcuts, and search engines. Talking of access, Firefox 123 adds a search bar to Firefox View […]
The open-source IRC client HexChat has announced its final ever release. HexChat 2.16.2 arrives with a small selection of bug fixes and new features for its long-standing fans to enjoy, but also bad news: after almost 12 years of continued development the party is over. “This will be the last release I make of HexChat,” app maintainer TingPing says in a blog post announcement. “The project has largely been unmaintained for years now and nobody else stepped up to do that work.” Prior to this one, HexChat’s previous release was back in 2021. That release was accompanied by a call […]
The latest version of the GNOME Network Displays app lets you stream your desktop to a wireless display using the Chromecast and Miracast over Infrastructure (MICE) protocols. Both features had been in development for a while and were long-standing requests from many in the Linux community. To see both land in a the recent release of GNOME Network Displays 0.91 is great, and makes working with wireless displays much easier. You can use GNOME Network Displays to mirror your screen or create a virtual screen. MICE support has been tested to stream a GNOME desktop to an LG WebOS smart […]
Lots of new features, er feature in the latest update to ONLYOFFICE, the open-source productivity suite for Windows, macOS, and Linux. ONLYOFFICE 8.0 introduces RTL support, albeit as an opt-in, beta feature. When enabled it enables RTL text in the UI and support for bidirectional text input in text documents and presentations — though devs stress it’s partial support with known limitations. Plenty of PDF improvements are provided in this update. This version makes it possible to encrypt regular PDFs with passwords to prevent unauthorised access, and create fillable PDF forms (which can’t encrypted) from editable DOCXF templates. The Presentation app […]
A new version of PeaZip, a popular free, open-source archive manager for Windows, macOS, and Linux, is available to download. PeaZip 9.7 is the first release to offer a native build for AArch64/ARM64 Linux. This means anyone can now use PeaZip on devices like the Raspberry Pi 4 & 5, the PineBook Pro, Lenovo X13s Gen 1, and similar. Although experimental testing and community-based ports of PeaZip for ARM have been available in the past PeaZip 9.7 is the first formal, native, official, etc build — though it’s provided as a portable build only (i.e. not a DEB or RPM). […]
A new version of Musictube, a Qt-based desktop app that lets you stream music from YouTube, is available for download for Windows, macOS and Linux. Musictube 2 is described as a “major overhaul” offering an improved search algorithm that now supports genres in addition to artists, albums and song titles. The user interface has been refreshed, sporting a “more modern, flatter and generally cleaner” look — a look matching the revamped UI Flavio’s local music player app Minitunes received a few months back. Other changes in Musictube 2 include lighter resource usage by only streaming audio when videos are hidden; […]
A brand new version of free, open-source office suite LibreOffice is ready to download. LibreOffice 24.2 is the follow up to last year’s LibreOffice 7.6 release. A leap because the latest edition is the first to use a calendar-based version number (like Ubuntu’s own): 24 denotes 2024, and 2 denotes the month, February. Switching to a date-based version number will allow LibreOffice users to know how up-to-date their version is. After all, LibreOffice 7.6 tells you nothing about when it was released, really. LibreOffice 24.2 ships with 6 months worth of developments from 5098 commits, spanning the full breadth, from […]
Mozilla Firefox 122 has been officially released, with an official Deb package debuting alongside it. Yes: there’s now an official Firefox Deb package for Debian-based distros, including Ubuntu. This gives users a safe, reliable way to get the latest version of their browser should (for whatever reason) they not want to use a repo, Snap, Flatpak, or PPA builds. Last year Mozilla launched their own dedicated apt repo to make it easier for Debian, Ubuntu, Linux Mint, etc users to install Firefox Nightly builds and, more recently, Developer Edition and Beta versions. Then adding a stable build feels like a […]