Linus Torvalds has announced that after Linux kernel 6.19, we'll finally reach the 7.0 iteration stage.

The post 4 Ways to Find Out Which Process Listening on a Particular Port first appeared on Tecmint: Linux Howtos, Tutorials & Guides . In this article, you will learn how to find which process or service is listening on a particular port in The post 4 Ways to Find Out Which Process Listening on a Particular Port first appeared on Tecmint: Linux Howtos, Tutorials & Guides.

LFS will no longer support SysVinit.

The post How to Find Command Location and Description in Linux first appeared on Tecmint: Linux Howtos, Tutorials & Guides . In this guide, you’ll learn five practical commands for discovering quick information about any binary command: its purpose, location, and The post How to Find Command Location and Description in Linux first appeared on Tecmint: Linux Howtos, Tutorials & Guides.

Today, the KDE Project released KDE Gear 25.12.2 as the second maintenance update to the latest **KDE Gear 25.12** series of this collection of open-source applications for the KDE ecosystem and other platforms. Coming about a month after **KDE Gear 25.12.1** , the KDE Gear 25.12.2 release updates the Dolphin file manager to reload context menu plugins when changing the configuration, avoid using the dynamic view if any items in the view are expanded, and ensure the font dialog retains the last custom selection. The KDE Intinerary travel assistant app is now a little bit less strict on manually entering flight numbers, clears the previously created trip name when creating a new trip group, and the global menu drawer has been restored in mobile mode. Also, the Kitinerary library received support for SNCF TER pass barcodes. The **Kdenlive** video editor received fixes for a crash that occurred when opening and quickly closing the settings, pasting of effects always enabling the built-in effects, a double free in audio thumbs, the sequence clips audio thumbnails, the monitor rotoscoping overlay, as well as the remaining issues in the clip monitor. Moreover, Kdenlive’s monitor dragging was refactored to fix audio/video only drag and disappearing audio waveform in the clip monitor. The video editor now also immediately applies changes to the clip monitor audio thumbnail and allows copying from the effects list description. The **NeoChat** chat client received some improvements as well to more reliably restore the last space and room, better handle notifications, decrypt when downloading single events from the server, make clicking room list section headers more reliable, and no longer show the “Share” action for non-file messages. Among other noteworthy changes, KDE Gear 25.12.2 improves the handling of the `-D` command line parameter in the kjournald daemon, fixes the decoding of multi-part uuencoded emails in the KMime library, and restores the generation of history documentation in the Konqueror web browser. Other apps like Akonadi, Akregator, Calligra, Elisa, Kalk, KAtomic, KDE Connect, Kontact, Kontrast, KWave, KWordQuiz, Okular, Tokodon, and Umbrello received smaller fixes as well, so check out the _full changelog_ for more details about the improvements and bug fixes included in KDE Gear 25.12.2. Meanwhile, keep an eye on the stable software repositories of your favorite GNU/Linux distribution for the KDE Gear 25.12.2 packages and update your installations as soon as possible for the best KDE apps experience, especially if you’re using the KDE Plasma desktop environment. ### _You might also like_

The Krita Foundation released today the first beta version of the upcoming Krita 6 series of this open-source, free, and cross-platform digital painting application for GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows systems. Ported to the latest Qt 6 open-source application framework for a modern UI/UX experience, the Krita 6 release promises major new features like Wayland color management support when Krita runs in native Wayland mode. However, for now, Krita 6 will only support KDE’s **KWin** window and composite manager. Krita 6 also promises a new knife tool for vector objects to let you merge and split vector objects, which can be extremely helpful when creating comic page layouts, new propagate colors and color overlay mask filters, and support for the recorder docker to capture in real time. There’s support for new file formats, including Radiance RGB. Additionally, JPEG-XL support has been improved, and text objects in **Photoshop** files can now be loaded as text in the upcoming Krita 6 release. Furthermore, Krita 6 promises to let you save text to PSD as well, but only in a limited way. Among other changes, the Freehand drawing tool has been updated in Krita 6 with a pixel-art stabilizer, the Liquify transform tool was made much faster, the pattern option has been extended with a soft texturing mode, and all blending modes have been checked for correctness when working in HDR. On top of that, the Python plugin API has been extended with an API for generating brush strokes, new user interface objects, and new methods for existing classes. The upcoming Krita 6 release also ships with new Python plugins and a new curve-linear perspective assistant. If you want to give Krita 6 a try, you can download the beta version from the _official website_. However, please keep in mind that this is a pre-release version, so don’t use it for production work. Check out the _release notes_ for more details about the changes included in Krita 6. ### _You might also like_

With new features, improvements, and bug fixes, LibreOffice 26.2 delivers a modern, polished office suite without compromise.

Canonical has pushed today new updates to **Ubuntu 24.04 LTS (Noble Numbat)** users, including the Linux 6.17 kernel and Mesa 25.2 graphics stacks from Ubuntu 25.10 (Questing Quokka). Released in April 2024, Ubuntu 24.04 LTS is a long-term supported series that will receive software updates and security patches for at least 5 years, until June 2029, as well as regular point releases every six months. The next expected Noble Numbat point release will be Ubuntu 24.04.4 LTS, which should see the light of day next week on February 12th, 2026. The big news is that Ubuntu 24.04.4 LTS will ship with newer kernel and graphics stacks for top-notch hardware support. For Ubuntu 24.04.4 LTS, Canonical plans to include the Linux 6.17 kernel and Mesa 25.2 graphics stacks from its latest interim release, **Ubuntu 25.10 (Questing Quokka)**. But, as expected, existing Ubuntu 24.04 LTS users are already receiving the new kernel and Mesa updates. The previous Noble Numbat point release, **Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS** , shipped with Linux kernel 6.14 and Mesa 25.0 graphics stack from the Ubuntu 25.04 (Plucky Puffin) release, which **reached the end of its supported life** last month on January 15th, 2026. Therefore, if you’re using Noble Numbat and want newer kernel and graphics stacks, make sure you update your installations today. Ubuntu 24.04.4 LTS is designed as an updated Noble Numbat media for those who want to deploy Ubuntu 24.04 LTS on new machines. If you’re not seeing the Linux 6.17 kernel and Mesa 25.2.8 updates, make sure you are using the main servers for the repositories, which you can set in the Software & Updates utility. As an alternative, you can manually install the `linux-generic-hwe-24.04` kernel package. Of course, after updating to the new kernel version, make sure that you rebuild any third-party kernel modules you might have installed, such as a **sound driver for your MacBook Pro** , to fix that dummy output issue. In fact, updating to Linux kernel 6.17 fixed the dummy sound output problem on my MacBook Pro! ### _You might also like_

The Document Foundation released **LibreOffice** 26.2 today as a major update for this open-source, free, and cross-platform office suite software for GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows systems. Highlights of LibreOffice 26.2 include a new option to use horizontal tabs instead of vertical in dialogs, the ability to insert hyperlinks from the context menu when text is selected, the ability to copy dialog screenshots to the clipboard, and expanded support for open standards to reinforce long-term access to documents. LibreOffice 26.2 also promises to improve performance and responsiveness across the entire office suite, helping large documents open, edit, and save more smoothly, as well as to enhance compatibility with documents created in proprietary and open source office software, reducing formatting issues and surprises. A couple of new experimental (opt-in) features have been added as well in LibreOffice 26.2, such as a new password-based ODF encryption mode called “ODF Wholesome Encryption” using AES‑GCM authenticated encryption and Argon2id key derivation, as well as a new consolidated Macro Manager dialog and basic IDE code completion. “LibreOffice 26.2 shows what happens when software is built around users, not business models, and how open-source software can deliver a modern, polished productivity suite without compromising user freedom,” said Florian Effenberger, Executive Director of The Document Foundation. “This release is about speed, reliability, and giving people control over their documents.” **LibreOffice Writer** word processor received new “Start” and “End” paragraph alignment support to align paragraphs relative to text direction when reusing styles, automatic RTL (Right-to-Left) direction detection while typing, and improved DOCX interoperability for floating tables, including the ability to split floating tables, and experimental provisional support for font-relative indentation units like ’em’ and ‘ic’. Writer also features better floating tables and pagination behavior, especially when combined with “keep with next” / “don’t split” paragraph attributes, as well as several tracking improvements like preserving old direct formatting for “format redlines” and better handling of interdependent changes when accepting changes. On top of that, anchored objects in Writer are no longer auto-selected after pasting, partly-deleted paragraphs will no longer clutter numbering lists, pasting a single image will automatically insert a caption if the AutoCaption Images setting is enabled, and the Spell-check dialog has a saner behavior for the “Correct All” list. **LibreOffice Calc** spreadsheet editor received diagram/flow‑style connector support, support for the BIFF12 (Excel 2007+) clipboard format, “Excel 2010–365 Spreadsheet” as default XLSX save target, support for saving natural-sort enablement and sort locale with the file, and the ability to treat decimal separators as characters. LibreOffice Calc also promises faster scrolling in sheets with lots of hidden columns, faster removal of duplicates, faster rejection of tracked changes, better performance for spreadsheets with lots of shapes on a sheet, and a new Matrix formulas shortcut (`Shift+Ctrl+Enter`) for switching to matrix mode. **LibreOffice Impress** presentation editor received support for inserting hyperlinks from the right-click menu when text is selected, support for copying dialog screenshots to the clipboard, explicit handling for embedded fonts that disallow editing, and better video/audio playback for common codecs on Windows systems. Moreover, the Layouts panel in the Impress sidebar, border presets, and shadow style position pickers now use a native IconView widget, the Theme dialog now uses a native IconView widget, sidebar palette entries now show a live preview when hovering, and 3D chart performance was significantly improved. LibreOffice 26.2 also makes the Base database editor truly multi-user, adds a progress bar to EPUB export, which is now much faster, improves line-height handling for DOC/DOCX documents written in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean, and improves markdown import and export to allow importing via clipboard and the use of ODT/DOCX templates. LibreOffice now prompts whether to open editable or read-only embedded fonts with restrictive licenses, automatically maps linkable tabular ranges to sheets when opened in Calc, improves Google Drive authentication, and promises faster SVG pattern-fill rendering on Linux systems. Under the hood, Skia rendering is now mandatory on macOS and Windows systems, the ScriptForge libraries gained notable additions like a `sharedmemory` service for persistent memory storage across scripts, and the internal Python was updated to Python 3.12 with additional standard modules shipped. You can download LibreOffice 26.2 right now from the _official website_ as ready-to-install binaries for 64-bit DEB and RPM-based distributions, such as Fedora Linux, Debian GNU/Linux, Ubuntu, and others. Of course, the source tarballs are also available for download for other GNU/Linux distributions. Worth noting is that the Linux builds provided by The Document Foundation were moved to an AlmaLinux 9 baseline and require the x86‑64‑v2 microarchitecture feature. Check out the _release notes_ for more details. LibreOffice 26.2 will be supported with a total of seven maintenance updates until November 30th, 2026. The first maintenance release, LibreOffice 26.2.1, is planned for the end of February with additional bug fixes. Until then, keep an eye on the stable software repositories of your Linux distros for the new LibreOffice version. _Image credits: The Document Foundation_ ### _You might also like_

The post 5 Must-Try AI Tools for Linux Users in 2026 first appeared on Tecmint: Linux Howtos, Tutorials & Guides . In this article, you will discover the best software tools powered by AI that you can install on your Linux The post 5 Must-Try AI Tools for Linux Users in 2026 first appeared on Tecmint: Linux Howtos, Tutorials & Guides.

Linux hardware vendor System76 released COSMIC 1.0.5 today as the latest stable update to this Rust-based desktop environment for **Pop!_OS Linux** and other GNU/Linux distributions. COSMIC Epoch 1.0.5 looks like a hefty update, adding a new option to show the battery percentage on laptops in the system tray applet, a Ctrl+C keyboard shortcut to copy to the clipboard and a Ctrl+S keyboard shortcut to copy to the Pictures folder, and the ability to drag and drop tabs in the COSMIC Files file manager. This release also updates COSMIC Settings to improve network authentication reliability, support user-defined XKB layouts, fix the rotation frequency of wallpaper slideshow resetting, and display a descriptive label instead of an empty drop-down if no default apps are available. Among other changes, COSMIC 1.0.5 fixes ligature support in the COSMIC Edit text editor and COSMIC Term terminal emulator, adds support for SVG app icons to COSMIC Launcher, and adds a Ctrl+Q keyboard shortcut to exit the app and improves the display of system and Flatpak runtime updates in COSMIC Store. Some performance improvements and other minor bug fixes are present as well in this new COSMIC release, so check out the release notes on the _project’s GitHub page_ for more details, from where you can download the source tarball if you fancy compiling COSMIC from sources on your Linux distro. Of course, compiling a desktop environment from sources is mostly for system integrators, so most users will have to wait for COSMIC 1.0.5 to land in their distro’s stable repositories to enjoy the new features and improvements. The COSMIC desktop environment can be installed on a wide range of GNU/Linux distributions, including Arch Linux, **CachyOS**, Fedora Linux, **PorteuX**, openSUSE Tumbleweed, **OpenMandriva Lx**, NixOS, **Garuda Linux** , Ubuntu (via PPA), **AerynOS**, System76’s Pop!_OS Linux, and many others, including their derivatives. ### _You might also like_

Mozilla finally landed today the long-anticipated **AI Kill Switch** controls for Firefox, which let users strip the open-source web browser of any AI-powered features, and you can test it right now in Firefox Nightly. In December 2025, when Mozilla appointed its new CEO, the company developing the popular Firefox web browser _revealed_ that it was working on an AI kill switch that would let users completely disable all the AI features that had been included in the past few releases, estranging more and more loyal users. Now, the AI kill switch is finally a reality as it landed today with the latest Firefox Nightly update. The implementation is called “AI Controls” and can be found in Firefox’s settings as a standalone section. From there, users can toggle a setting called “Block AI Enhancements” to remove any AI features. “ _Blocking means you won’t see new or current AI enhancements in Firefox, or pop-ups about them_ ,” reads the AI kill switch toggle, which also points users to a page where they can learn more about what’s included and how to control traditional machine learning features. When clicking the toggle, you’ll see a pop-up that informs you about which AI features have been disabled in Firefox, including translations, image alt text in the PDF viewer, tab group suggestions, key points in link previews, and chatbot providers in the sidebar. Add-ons that use Firefox’s AI feature will also be blocked. After blocking the AI features, you will be able to enable them selectively from the On-Device AI controls in the same section. You can also block them partially without enabling the “Block AI Enhancements” toggle. Additionally, you can choose which AI chatbot to use in the sidebar, if any. To test the AI Controls in Firefox Nightly, you must first enable them from about:config by setting the `browser.preferences.aiControls` option from `false` to `true`. Mozilla plans to ship the AI kill switch for everyone with the next major release of the web browser, **Firefox 148** , which is expected on February 24th, 2026. The Firefox 148 release also promises to improve support for screen readers, add WebGPU support to service workers, add support for the Sanitizer API, which provides new methods for HTML manipulation, and add support for the Trusted Types API, which prevents cross-site scripting attacks. ### _You might also like_

Git 2.53 has been released today as the latest stable update to this free and open-source distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency. Coming two and a half months after **Git 2.52** , the Git 2.53 release introduces a new `is-needed` subcommand to the `git maintenance` command to tell if it’s necessary to perform various maintenance tasks, adds a `--diff-algorithm=` option to the `git blame` command, and adds an `--all` option to the `git repo info` command. Git 2.53 also updates the experimental `git replay` command to perform ref updates itself in a transaction by default, rather than emitting where each ref should point and leaving the actual update to another command. The `git apply` and `git diff` commands received a new whitespace error class called `incomplete-line`, the `git fast-import` command got a `--signed-commits=strip-if-invalid` option to drop invalid cryptographic signatures from objects, and the `git repo struct` command learned to take `-z` as a synonym of `--format=nul`. Git 2.53 also updates the help message from the `git branch` command to mention “git help” instead of “man” when suggesting to read some documentation, adds a new manual that describes the data model, and clarifies the use of “revision” (a connected set of commits) in the “git replay” documentation. Of course, this release comes with numerous improvements and bug fixes, so check out the _release notes_ for more details about the changes included in Git 2.53, which is available for download from the _official website_ as a source tarball if you fancy compiling software from sources. _Image credits: Logo by the Git project_ ### _You might also like_

**The 277th installment of the 9to5Linux Weekly Roundup is here for the week ending February 1st, 2026, keeping you updated on the most important developments in the Linux world. If you missed last week’s 9to5Linux Weekly Roundup, catch up with everything GNU/Linux/Open Sourcehere.** ## Thank you! I would like to thank everyone who sent us donations; your generosity is greatly appreciated. I also want to thank all of you for your continued support by commenting, liking, sharing, and boosting the articles, following us on social media, and, last but not least, sending us feedback. The end of January brought us new software releases, including GParted 1.8, Calibre 9.0, Transmission 4.1, GStreamer 1.28, OpenSSL 3.6.1, VirtualBox 7.2.6, Shotcut 26.1, TigerVNC 1.16, and Proton 10.0-4, as well as several distro releases, including Tails 7.4.1, AerynOS 2026.01, Linux Lite 7.8, GParted Live 1.8, and Emmabuntüs DE 5 1.05. On top of that, I tell you all about Xfce’s upcoming Wayland compositor written in Rust and the new Linux laptop from TUXEDO Computers. Below, you can check out this week’s hottest news and access all the distro and package downloads released this past week in the 9to5Linux roundup for February 1st, 2026. ## Website changes I’ve been working on a new dark mode implementation for the website that should be cleaner and faster. It’s not 100% finished, so if you experience any issues with the dark theme or have suggestions, please let me know through the usual channels. Thank you, and I hope you’ll enjoy it! ## Hot news of the week * GParted 1.8 open-source partition editor brings many fixes and enhancements * Emmabuntüs Debian Edition 5 gets new accessibility features, Debian 12.13 base * Proton 10.0-4 is out with support for Drop Dead: The Cabin and Quantum Threshold * OpenSSL 3.6.1 is now available with important security patches and bug fixes * Xfce desktop environment is getting a Rust-based Wayland compositor * TigerVNC 1.16 is now available with support for sharing Wayland desktops * GStreamer 1.28 open-source multimedia framework is here as a major update * Transmission 4.1 open-source BitTorrent client arrives as a massive update * TUXEDO Computers unveils Intel-powered InfinityBook Max 15 Gen10 Linux laptop * Debian-based GParted Live 1.8 is out with Linux kernel 6.18 LTS, GParted 1.8 * VirtualBox 7.2.6 adds initial support for Linux kernel 6.19 and improvements * Calibre 9.0 open-source ebook manager now available with new Bookshelf view * Tails 7.4.1 is out as an emergency release patching critical OpenSSL vulnerabilities * AerynOS 2026.01 arrives with Linux kernel 6.18 LTS, GNOME 49.3, and more * Linux Lite 7.8 is here based on Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS and many apps ported to GTK4 * Shotcut 26.1 open-source video editor arrives with hardware video decoding ## Other GNU/Linux news of interest * Budgie 10.10.1 desktop lands minor improvements as work continues on Budgie 11 ## Linux distributions released this week * Arch Linux 2026.02.01 * Parrot OS 7.1 Security * Parrot OS 7.1 Home * Linux Lite 7.8 * AerynOS 2026.01 GNOME * Tails 7.4.1 * AUSTRUMI 5.1.8 * KDE neon 20260129 * Bluestar Linux 6.18.7 * GParted Live 1.8.0 * Alpine Linux 3.23.3 * CentOS Stream 10-20260126 ## Linux apps, drivers, desktops, and kernels released this week * DBeaver 25.3.4 * Shotcut 26.1 * Calibre 9.1 * Linux kernel 6.18.8 LTS * Linux kernel 6.12.68 LTS * Linux kernel 6.6.122 LTS * Tor Browser 15.0.5 * AppArmor 4.1.4 * OpenLDAP 2.6.12 * MAME 0.285 * GNU gettext 1.0 * Qt 6.10.2 * Tor 0.4.8.22 * Mozilla Thunderbird 147.0.1 * VirtualBox 7.2.6 * Chromium 144.0.7559.109 * Transmission 4.1 * GStreamer 1.28 * CMake 4.2.3 * TigerVNC 1.16 * OpenSSL 3.6.1 * Mozilla Firefox 147.0.2 * Docker 29.2.0 * GParted 1.8 * Krita 5.2.15 ## Coming up next week * LibreOffice 26.2 * GNOME 50 Beta * GNOME 49.4 * KDE Gear 25.12.2 * Linux kernel 6.19 * …and hopefully many other exciting Linux news and releases! ### _You might also like_

Shotcut 26.1 has been released today as a major update to this open-source, free, and cross-platform video editing software written in Qt for GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows systems. The biggest change in the Shotcut 26.1 release is support for hardware video decoding, a highly anticipated feature that is enabled by default on all supported platforms, except on Linux systems with **NVIDIA** GPUs. Hardware video decoding can be enabled or disabled from Settings > Preview Scaling > Use Hardware Decoder. On Linux, hardware video decoding uses the Video Acceleration API (VA-API), while on Windows it uses Media Foundation, and on macOS it uses Video Toolbox. As expected, hardware video decoding only supports codecs your hardware can decode and will automatically fall back to software decoding if needed. While hardware video decoding reduces CPU usage, which can help lower battery drain and keep your system cooler, it doesn’t provide a dramatic speed boost unless you use Linear 10-bit CPU processing mode or have a low-powered CPU. Also, it has a limited impact on seeking and scrubbing. “”What took so long?” you might ask. A good way to manage it across all operating systems and GPU vendor APIs,” said the devs. “Management comes in the forms of operating system abstraction APIs, hardware scaling, and a threshold limiter.” Along with hardware decoding, there’s an Export > Codec > Use hardware decoder option, which can reduce CPU usage during export and has no resolution or frame rate limits. However, this feature is disabled by default as it can sometimes increase export times, and it’s persistent, so it will be remembered between sessions. Among other changes, Shotcut 26.1 adds the ability to convert a project between GPU and CPU processing modes, adds a Blend Mode filter and track option for the Linear 10-bit GPU/CPU processing mode, and increases the maximum resolution in Video Mode and Export to 8640 for 8K VR180 videos. It also improves the appearance of outline in the Text: Simple, Typewriter, GPS Text, Subtitle Burn In, and Timer text filters, changes bulk proxy generation to update clips, changes Timeline > Add Generator and New Generator > Add To Timeline to not seek, and changes simple keyframe defaults in the Mask: From File filter to be more convenient for multi-track transitions. Of course, various bugs were fixed as well, so check out the _release notes_ for more details. Meanwhile, you can download Shotcut 26.1 from the _official website_ as a universal AppImage bundle that you can run on virtually any GNU/Linux distribution without installing anything. ### _You might also like_

Linux Lite 7.8 has been released today as the latest stable update to this Ubuntu-based distribution using the lightweight Xfce desktop environment and based on the latest Ubuntu LTS series. Derived from **Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS** (Noble Numbat) and powered by Linux kernel 6.8, Linux Lite 7.8 introduces rewrites to no less than twelve of the in-house applications using Python and GTK4, including Lite Welcome, Lite Software, Lite Sources, Lite Updates, Lite Auto Login, Lite User Manager, Lite Desktop, Lite Sounds, Lite System Report, Lite Firewall, Lite Network Shares, and Lite DPI. Apart from being ported to Python/GTK4, the Lite Software app has been updated with support for more than 20 apps that users can now install in their brand-new Linux Lite system, including Darktable, BleachBit, Kdenlive, and others. Also updated was the System Monitoring Center app to show more system info in the System tab. “We’re most excited about the new Lite Software. We’ve added more than 20 popular applications, BleachBit, Darktable, KDE Connect, Kdenlive, and Stacer, to name a few,” said developer Jerry Bezencon. “We’ve updated the System tab in System Monitoring Center to include more system information.” Linux Lite 7.8 also adds support for newer Linux kernels, including the latest **Linux 6.18 LTS** , which can be installed from the Linux Lite repository if you need support for newer hardware devices. Currently, Linux Lite supports kernels from Linux 3.13 to Linux 6.18 LTS. Several default applications have been updated as well, and this release ships with the Google Chrome 144.0 web browser, Mozilla Thunderbird 140.7.0 ESR email client, **LibreOffice 25.8.4** office suite, **VLC 3.0.20** media player, GIMP 2.10.36 image editor, and others. Check out the _release announcement page_ for more details, from where you can download Linux Lite 7.8 as a live ISO image for 64-bit systems. This release uses the latest Xfce 4.18 desktop environment by default, highly customized using the Materia desktop theme, Papirus icon theme, and Roboto Regular fonts. ### _You might also like_