Linux

Colorado’s governor signed the SB26-051 age verification bill into law with its exemption for open-source, while Linux usage on Steam is down a little over one percent from April’s peak.

An amendment to California’s AB 1856 would change the definition of an “operating system provider” to exclude open-source software from California’s age verification law, mirroring a similar exemption in Colorado. If the bill passes, it could resolve an issue that has caused chaos for Linux developers around the world.

As Phoronix reports, the Plasma 6.7 beta includes the module for the desktop environment’s TV-friendly UI, which was dropped from Plasma’s release schedule in 2024. It’s made for Linux PCs hooked up to TVs — like Valve’s upcoming Steam Machine, which runs on SteamOS and uses KDE Plasma.

Discord has announced some big improvements available now in its Linux client. Phoronix notes that they include official support for more distros, support for hardware-accelerated video encoding, improved screen capture, better power efficiency on Steam Deck, support for Discord’s official auto-updater, and more.

Similar to the “Copy Fail” exploit revealed a week ago, the two “Dirty Frag” exploits (CVE-2026-43284) also allow a local user to give themselves root privileges on nearly any Linux distribution. The researcher who found it says that, “Because the embargo has now been broken, no patches or CVEs exist for these vulnerabilities.”

Good: Running PC copies of two specific games (Wukong, Crimson Desert) performance can meet or barely beat native PS5! Control at 1080p50-60 with checkerboard RT reflections instead of 1440p30!

Ubuntu’s web infrastructure remains unavailable after going offline Thursday morning, blocking updates and other access at a time when Linux admins really need to apply a patch.

As XDA reports, the Arch-based Linux distro’s April update now “automatically configures fingerprint readers for ‘sudo’ prompts” and “detects specific Intel CPUs for better power saving,” among other new features and fixes. CachyOS users can run the command “sudo pacman -Syu” to update to the latest release.

While hyping up its couch keyboard, Framework CEO Nirav Patel showed images of how people use its computers in the living room. It gave me a Leo DiCaprio moment as I noticed a photo from my time testing Bazzite on the Framework Desktop. How about a photo credit, Nirav?

An update to the AMDGPU kernel graphics driver for Linux adds a “power module” that Windows uses to manage display features like backlight and self-refresh, Phoronix reports. The patch should improve power management for displays on Linux devices, potentially leading to fewer display issues and better battery life, especially on laptops.

France’s Interministerial Directorate for Digital Affairs (DINUM) has announced its “exit from Windows in favor of workstations running on the Linux operating system,” as XDA reports. It’s part of a broader shift away from non-European tech — in January, France’s government also launched its own videoconferencing platform to replace Teams, Zoom, and Google Meet.

As OMG Ubuntu points out, the new minimum is in place beginning with version 26.04, scheduled for release on April 23rd. You’ll still be able to install Ubuntu on systems with less RAM, if you can stomach it, but a lighter Linux distro might be a better pick, like Linux Mint or Lubuntu.

The chip that was originally released 37 years ago in 1989 will no longer have kernel support on Linux 7.1, as Phoronix reports. Of course, anyone still hanging onto an i486 can always stick to a long-term support (LTS) Linux kernel version. Meanwhile, Microsoft no longer supports some CPUs from less than a decade ago.

Steam’s hardware and software survey says Linux users more than doubled from 2.23 percent in February, jumping to a record high of 5.33 percent of Steam users. Linux has been steadily gaining popularity on Steam over the past several months, previously peaking at 3.58 percent in December.

Benchmark test results from Phoronix show KDE Plasma 6.6 consistently outperforming GNOME 50 on Ubuntu 26.04 while using both AMD and Nvidia graphics cards. While these results could vary based on distro and hardware, gamers might want to opt for KDE over GNOME as the desktop environment for their next Linux gaming PC.

Linux gaming is getting better every day, but I’m not sure that anyone had this on their 2026 bingo card. Support for guitar controllers is being baked directly into the Linux 7.0 kernel, including some licensed models, such as the PDP RiffMaster and CRKD Gibson SG.

GamingOnLinux points out that while Valve’s December 2025 Steam hardware survey originally showed a slight drop in Linux users to 3.19 percent, the data has now been amended.

At the opening of a new Johannesburg office, Canva’s Global Marketing Lead for Affinity, Liam Fisher, commented to TechCentral that native Linux support for Affinity is one of the top requests, and it’s “being discussed seriously internally.”

At least, according to a new trove of benchmark data collected by Gamers Nexus, which compares game performance on one of the most popular gaming Linux distributions.

Nathan is jumping to Linux, pushed to the brink by AI agents and Copilot, tempted by the promise of better gaming through Bazzite. This is it, guys.