Those unhappy with how Windows 11 22H2 behaves or looks can roll back to the previous installation. The process is relatively simple and fast, and it does not require installing Windows from scratch. Also, it is the same regardless of whether you are moving back to Windows 10 or the initial release of Windows 11.

It is worth noting that this article describes uninstalling major feature updates, not patches Microsoft releases several times per month. We have a dedicated guide that explains how to uninstall troublesome Windows updates.

Important: Back up everything necessary on your computer before uninstalling Windows 11 22H2 to avoid potential data loss. Also, you will lose apps installed after updating to Windows 11 22H2.

Finally, before you start, do note that you only have ten days to roll back after installing Windows 11 22H2. The operating system disables the option to go back once that period is over, leaving a clean install the only option to return to the old build. Running disk cleanup will immediately make it impossible to restore the previous installation.

How to go back from Windows 11 22H2 to the previous build?

1. If you use a tablet or laptop, connect it to a power source. Windows 11 will not let you roll back to the previous build, even if the battery is full.
2. Open the Settings app and go to Windows Update > Advanced Options.

   

3. Click Recovery.

   

4. Find the Recovery options section and click the Go back button.

   

5. Windows 11 will ask the reason you want to uninstall the latest update. You cannot skip this step, so select whatever option you like to help Microsoft improve its products. Pick one of the answers and click Next.

   

6. On the next step, click No, thanks, unless you want to give Windows 11 22H2 another try and check for available updates that potentially might help improve the experience.

   

7. Carefully read the What you need to know information on the next step and click Next to acknowledge it.

   

8. Now ensure you know the password from the previous installation and press Next.

   

9. Click Go back to the earlier build or Go back to Windows 10.

   

10. Your device will restart immediately and start the downgrade process. It will take some time, depending on how powerful your computer is.

Sit back and wait for Windows 11 to complete the procedure. The operating system will boot normally and get you to the login screen once the rollback is completed.

Guide: How to uninstall Windows 11 22H2 and roll back to previous build

The updates in the Windows 11 22H2 are all about improving users’ experience to make things more convenient and easier. With that, it’s nice to know that the drag and drop capability will also be resurrected in the taskbar so you can drag files to apps again. Snap Layouts are also being improved in this update to allow the dragging of an app to the top of a window, and it will show the layouts available. Focus, on the other hand, will now include a Do Not Disturb mode that will let you silence unnecessary notifications. Additionally, the new Start menu folders coming in Windows 11 22H2 will promote the better organization of apps in the Start. Using this new feature, you can drag and drop one icon to another, and you will be able to create a folder that you can name.

The Windows 11 22H2 will further give you new features like the “Spotlight Collection,” where a series of wallpapers will loop on the desktop throughout the day. Task Manager, meanwhile, will come with a better layout and a new dark mode complemented by a new command bar and efficiency mode. Finally, it’s a good thing that Windows 11 22H2 will have built-in Live Captions for automatic audio captions on the device.

If you are interested in getting the Windows 11, version 22H2 Build 22621, it is important to note that you might encounter some issues, be it known or unknown. With this, it is best to make sure to back up your files. Once you’re decided and ready, open Settings and proceed to Windows Update, then to the Windows Insider Program page. Select the Get started button and then the Link an account button.

Once you’ve selected your Microsoft account, click Continue and Release Preview. There will be prompts that will pop out for confirmation. Just click Continue. After that, click Start now button. After restarting the computer, visit Settings once more and select Windows Update. Click Check for updates and then the Download & install button. Restart the computer again by clicking the Restart now button that will appear.

The steps mentioned above should upgrade your current OS to Windows 11 version 22H2. Nonetheless, if the final version of 22H2 fails to download from the Release Preview Channel, you can opt for the Beta Channel, where the final version is also available. Also, once the upgrade is all set, make sure to step out of the program to prevent your computer from acquiring the next version’s preview builds.

Windows 11 22H2 Build 22621: What To Expect and How To Get It?

Edge 104 hit the Dev channel last week with much bigger release notes you can check out in our dedicated article.

What is new in Microsoft Edge Dev 104.0.1278.2?

New features:

• Added support for displaying the correct channel-specific Edge icon in the Search and Spotlight UI for macOS.

Improved reliability: 

• Improved the width of the text content display box in reading mode on tablets. 

Changed behavior: 

• iOS: Improved performance on Citrix. 

Microsoft also wants Edge Insiders to provide feedback about communication platforms the company uses to gather suggestions and complaints from users. The company has launched an anonymous survey in which everyone is free to participate. You can help Microsoft improve its products by sharing your opinion in the survey using this link.

Microsoft Edge Dev is available for everyone to test on Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android. In case you missed it, the software giant recently promoted Edge 103 to the Beta channel for final testing.

Microsoft Edge 104.0.1278.2 adds improved icons on macOS

The feature was first spotted by reverse engineer Alessandro Paluzzi at the start of the year. It then formally entered the testing phase in April when it became available for select users. It should now be usable for everyone.

You might think the ability to pin content is unnecessary as people typically use story highlights that appear as bubble-shaped thumbnails under the profile picture and follower count. However, pinning posts in the profile grid might be welcomed by those who want their content to be even more visible for people who visit their profile.

You can pin up to three posts or Reels to the top of your profile. They will be positioned at the front of the Instagram grid, similar to pinned content on Twitter and Tiktok.

The process to pin content is fairly simple. Select one of your posts, hit the three dots icon on the top-right corner, and choose the "Pin to your profile" option. If anyone visits your profile, they will see pinned posts starting from the top-left corner of your grid, with pinned content highlighted by a white pin icon.

Source: Instagram via The Verge

You can now pin up to three posts to the top of your Instagram profile grid

Reader Mode has different names depending on the browser that is used. Reader Mode is common, but you may also encounter the names Reader View or Immersive View.

All have in common that they remove elements from webpages that are unrelated to the main article; this may include navigational elements, advertisement, sidebar content, or user comments.

The majority of Reader Modes require manual activation, either through clicks on an icon in the browser's toolbar or through keyboard shortcuts.

Brave Browser includes an option to toggle Reader Mode automatically for all articles that you encounter. The article listings on Ghacks, for instance, are not displayed in the reading mode, but when an article is opened, it is displayed automatically.

Brave notes that it uses a technique that is modifying the page before it is downloaded, and that this saves bandwidth and loading time. The automated nature of the mode in Brave gives it that advantage over the feature in other browsers, as it is required to activate the mode manually in most browsers.

Enable Reader Mode

Reader Mode can be enabled for specific websites in Brave. A click on the Reader Mode icon in the address bar of the Browser displays the option to do so. You may use the same menu to turn off Reader Mode for a specific site, if the feature is enabled for all sites.

Reader Mode Configuration

Reader Mode automation settings are provided in the browser's preferences:

1. Load brave://settings/appearance in the browser's address bar to open the Appearance Settings.
2. Scroll down until you find the Speedreader preference on the page.
3. Toggle it to enable or disable it.

When you enable it, Brave will load all articles in Reader Mode automatically. You may then use the address bar icon to turn it off for specific sites.

Reader Mode implementations may display unnecessary content when invoked in the browser, and none support options to modify the behavior on certain sites. They improve accessibility significantly in some cases though.

Now You: do you use Reader Mode in your browser of choice?

Configure Brave Browser to display all articles in Reader Mode

Despite sharing a common Chromium codebase, browser makers like Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi don't have plans on crippling support for ad blocker extensions in their products -- as Google is currently planning on doing within Chrome.

The three browsers makers have confirmed to ZDNet, or in public comments, of not intending to support a change to the extensions system that Google plans to add to Chromium, the open-source browser project on which Chrome, Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi are all based on.

The Manifest V3 scandal

Google announced plans to modify the Chromium extension system last October when the browser maker said it would develop a new set of standards -- collectively known as Manifest V3 -- that will modify how extensions work on top of the Chromium codebase.

It took extension developers a few months to understand how intrusive the Manifest V3 modifications were, but they did eventually realize that Google was planning to replace one of the main technology through which extensions interacted with website requests, in favor of one that was far inferior.

Initially, it was thought that extensions which provided ad-blocking services would be the ones impacted the most, but it was later also discovered that extensions for antivirus products, parental control enforcement, and various privacy-enhancing services were also affected.

Users protested against Google's decision, and the company came under heavy criticism from the public -- with many users accusing it of trying to sabotage ad-blocking extensions that were cutting into Google's advertising business profits.

Google backtracked on the change a month later, in mid-February, but it appears that the promise to keep the old extension technology intact was just a lie.

At the end of May, Google made a new announcement in which it said that the old technology that ad blockers were relying on would only be available for Chrome enterprise users, but not for regular users.

This time, Chrome developers seem intent on plowing through with their decision, with the Manifest V3 changes being scheduled to go live in January 2020, when ad blocker extensions would see their ability to block ads greatly diminished.

The move has angered Chrome users beyond belief, with many vowing to switch browsers, and many setting their eyes on Firefox, whose developers have been working to transform and rebrand the former fan-favorite into a privacy-first product.

But Google's planned Manifest V3 changes are being added to the Chromium base, meaning they'll also likely impact other Chromium-based browsers as well.

Brave

In an email to ZDNet on Friday, Brendan Eich, CEO of Brave Software, said the Brave browser plans to support the old extension technology that Google is currently deprecating.

"To respond on the declarativeWebRequest change (restricting webRequest in full behind an enterprise policy screen), we will continue to support webRequest for all extensions in Brave," Eich told ZDNet.

In addition, Brave itself supports a built-in ad blocker, that users can utilize as an alternative to any extension.

Furthermore, Eich told ZDNet that Brave would continue to support uBlock Origin and uMatrix, the two extensions developed by Raymond Hill, the Chrome extension developer who's been highlighting Google's plans to sabotage Chrome ad blockers for the past months.

Opera

ZDNet also received a similar statement from Opera, another browser vendor which uses the Chromium codebase.

"We might also consider keeping the referenced APIs working, even if Chrome doesn't, but again, this is not really an issue for the more than 300 million people who have chosen Opera," an Opera spokesperson told us.

This is because, just like Brave, Opera also ships with a built-in ad blocker.

"All the Opera browsers, both on mobile and PC, come with an ad blocker that users can choose to enable," the spokesperson said. "This means that Opera users aren't really exposed to these changes - unlike users of most other browsers."

Further, this ad blocker is very configurable because it also allows users to import custom domain lists, so users can block any advertising domain they want, giving them full control of what types of ads they can see, or not.

Vivaldi

Vivaldi, another pretty popular Chromium-based browser, published a blog post on Monday affirming its support for giving users a choice -- even if the company has not yet decided how it will proceed.

"How we tackle the API change depends on how Google implements the restriction," said Petter Nilsen, Senior Developer at Vivaldi.

"Once the change is introduced to Chromium, believe me when I say that there are many, many possible scenarios. Restoring the API could be one of them. We've restored functionality before," Nilsen said.

"If the API is removed altogether and no decent alternative is implemented, we might look into creating a limited extensions store.

"The good news is that whatever restrictions Google adds, at the end we can remove them. Our mission will always be to ensure that you have the choice," Nilsen added.

Microsoft Edge

The only major browser maker who did not respond to our request for comment on this issue was Microsoft.

The company announced last year it was ditching its proprietary EdgeHTML browser engine for a Chromium port of Edge, which is currently in public testing.

Microsoft's plans in regards to Google's Manifest V3 changes are currently unknown.

Source

Unlike Meta-owned social media platforms, Telegram is entirely free. The messenger app has not been officially monetized, though the company has been exploring support for ads like sponsored messages in the public channels.

Back in 2021, Pavel Durov, the founder of the Telegram messenger, confirmed that it was exploring new ways to place ads within the posts of public channels. According to the company, Telegram's experimental ads will be small posts with a limit of just 160 characters and they won't include external links, but the ads will have a link to a specific channel. 

In addition to official advertisements in the messaging app, Telegram is also bringing a new premium subscription to the messaging app.

The company is planning to launch a subscription platform that would reportedly start at $4.99 and reduce the limitations of the messaging app. However, the details of the premium plan are sketchy as of now.

A Telegram channel, which keeps track of new features coming to the platform, shared a list of expected changes coming to the platform:

• Doubled Limits.
• 4 GB Upload Size.
• Faster Download Speed.
• Voice-to-Text Conversion.
• No Ads.
• Unique Reactions.
• Premium Stickers.
• Advanced Chat Management.
• Profile Badge.
• Animated avatars.
• Additional application icons.

Telegram Premium is already live in the beta version for Android, but you cannot subscribe to the service at the moment.

Telegram to soon launch its premium plan at $4.99 per month

Changelog

Highlights

Full changelog

Known issues

For those who don’t know, Microsoft PowerToys is a set of utilities, including ColorPicker, FancyZones, and File Explorer Add-ons, letting users customize Windows. By using the set of utilities, users can tune and streamline their Windows experience for greater productivity.

To get the latest version of the app, you need to open the Settings and go to the ‘General’ tab from the navigation pane on the left. Now, you need to scroll down to the very end of the General tab to the ‘Updates’ section and then click on ‘Check for updates.’

You can find the PowerToys app in the Microsoft Store. Alternatively, you can also download the app here from this link. Meanwhile, you can track all the latest news related to it here.

Microsoft releases PowerToys v0.59.0, here is what’s new

Windows 11 22H2, aka Sun Valley 2, is the operating system's next feature update and is expected only to have a few minor improvements and new features.

Last month, we reported that Windows 11 22H2 build 22621 was the Released to Manufacturing (RTM) build, which is the product's final build before its release to OEMs and other partners for installation in new devices.

Furthermore, hardware developers are to use that branch for developing new drivers to be submitted to Microsoft's Windows Hardware Compatibility Program.

Windows 11 22H2 moved to the Release channel

Today, Microsoft announced that they had moved the Windows 11 22H2 feature update to the 'Release' channel, available for both Windows 10 and Windows 11 insiders, indicating that they are getting close to releasing it. 

"Today we are making Windows 11, version 22H2 Build 22621 available in the Release Preview Channel for Windows Insider Program for Business participants to validate on devices in their organizations," Microsoft announced today in a blog post.

"Commercial devices* configured for the Release Preview Channel via the Windows Insider Program Settings page or via Windows Update for Business policy, whether through Microsoft Intune or through Group Policy, will automatically be offered Windows 11, version 22H2 as an optional update provided that the device(s) meet the hardware requirements. Windows 11, version 22H2 is also now available via Windows Server Update Service and Azure Marketplace."

Microsoft also states that Windows 11 22H2 is now available to 'seekers' in the release channel with compatible hardware. Seekers are Windows Insiders who manually check for new Windows updates.

Unfortunately, Windows 11 22H2 is a minor release with only a few new features and improvements revolving around user interface changes, the Start Menu, the task manager, and the taskbar.

With that said, it is still recommended that users install Windows 10 22H2 when released, as it will come with bug fixes and performance improvements.

We should also expect Microsoft to continue to release security updates and bug fixes in the release channel until it is ultimately released to the public in the fall.

Windows 11 22H2 closer to release, lands in the Release channel

The official Microsoft Edge Dev Twitter account revealed some stats about how Edge saves resources. According to Microsoft, during the last 28 days, Sleeping Tabs helped save more than 273 Petabytes of RAM (273,000TB). The feature worked across 6 billion tabs, saving roughly 40MB of memory per tab.

40MB of RAM may not sound that impressive, but it is actually a big deal when you consider that an average consumer usually keeps tens of tabs open all the time. Also, not everyone has a computer with plenty of RAM, where 40MB of saved memory does not make any difference.

Sleeping Tabs will come in handy for people with inexpensive computers or those buying the recently announced Surface Laptop Go 2. Microsoft thinks 4GB of RAM in a $599 laptop is acceptable, so at least Edge can back you up and squeeze out some RAM for other tasks.

Sleeping Tabs is enabled by default on all Microsoft Edge installations. It automatically puts inactive pages to sleep after two hours of idling, but you can customize the feature by changing the timeout or selecting websites for the browser to keep active.

To personalize Sleeping Tabs in Edge, open edge://settings and go to System and Performance> Optimize Performance. You can also pair Sleeping Tabs with Efficiency Mode, which reduces CPU strain on less powerful computers.

Do you use Sleeping Tabs in Microsoft Edge? Let us know in the comments section below!

Microsoft says Sleeping Tabs in Edge saved more than 273 Petabytes of RAM in 28 days

Apple will allow Linux VMs to run Intel apps with Rosetta in macOS Ventura

Intermediary pages may be used for user tracking, the display of advertisement, or other purposes.

The browser extension is available for Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and other Chromium-based browsers. FastForward is a fork of the discontinued Universal Bypass extension, which we have reviewed in 2018 here on this site.

The extension is open source, and you may check out the GitHub repository here to get a look at the code.

Skip the intermediary page

Plenty of sites and services use intermediary pages. Some use them for tracking purposes, others to reduce the display of web addresses on their sites, or to earn revenue. Depending on the type of intermediary page, users may be redirected automatically to the destination, may wait before they may continue, or are required to complete an action.

FastForward bypasses intermediary pages automatically. The extension works automatically once it is installed in a compatible browser.

It is recommended that you check the preferences first, as you may want to adjust some of the settings before you start using it. To do so, left-click on the extension icon.

Crowd Bypass uses the wisdom of all users of the extension to enable bypasses for intermediary links that can't be bypassed automatically. Basically, what it does is take the information from the first user who does whatever is required to reach the destination and hand it to all other users of the extension.

While that is useful on one hand, some users may not want the information to be submitted to the project. The team notes that the intermediary page URL, the destination URL, and a hash of the user's IP address are recorded in the process.

You may uncheck "Crowd Bypass: Give and take destinations of unbypassable shorteners" to disable the feature.

Developers who use the extension may test custom bypasses and to submit these to the team so that all users benefit from them.

A list of example redirects is provided on the project's website.

Closing Words

FastForward is a useful browser extension that skips intermediary pages. It speeds up the loading of the destination and may improve privacy in doing so. Internet users who encounter these intermediary pages regularly benefit the most from the installation.

Landing page:   https://github.com/FastForwardTeam/FastForward

Now You: how do you deal with intermediary pages?

FastForward: skip tracker and intermediary URLs automatically

As discovered by 9to5Mac, iOS 16 now renders the stock wallpaper in real-time to enable the new animations and effects. However, iPadOS 16 lacks the redesigned lock screen and its capabilities, so it maintains static stock wallpaper in two variants: light and dark.

And here is the default macOS Ventura wallpaper in its orange high-res glory. Like iOS 16, it has dark and light options.

iOS 16, iPadOS 16, watchOS 9, and macOS Venture are currently available in Beta for developers. Apple has promised to release free public betas for everyone to try in a few weeks. You can expect the new operating systems to hit the stable channel somewhere this fall alongside the launch of the upcoming iPhone "14."

Here are default iOS 16 and macOS Ventura wallpapers

Their system boosts the speeds of programs that run in the Unix shell, a ubiquitous programming environment created 50 years ago that is still widely used today. Their method parallelizes these programs, which means that it splits program components into pieces that can be run simultaneously on multiple computer processors.

This enables programs to execute tasks like web indexing, natural language processing, or analyzing data in a fraction of their original runtime.

"There are so many people who use these types of programs, like data scientists, biologists, engineers, and economists. Now they can automatically accelerate their programs without fear that they will get incorrect results," says Nikos Vasilakis, research scientist in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT.

The system also makes it easy for the programmers who develop tools that data scientists, biologists, engineers, and others use. They don't need to make any special adjustments to their program commands to enable this automatic, error-free parallelization, adds Vasilakis, who chairs a committee of researchers from around the world who have been working on this system for nearly two years.

Vasilakis is senior author of the group's latest research paper, which includes MIT co-author and CSAIL graduate student Tammam Mustafa and will be presented at the USENIX Symposium on Operating Systems Design and Implementation. Co-authors include lead author Konstantinos Kallas, a graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania; Jan Bielak, a student at Warsaw Staszic High School; Dimitris Karnikis, a software engineer at Aarno Labs; Thurston H.Y. Dang, a former MIT postdoc who is now a software engineer at Google; and Michael Greenberg, assistant professor of computer science at the Stevens Institute of Technology.

A decades-old problem

This new system, known as PaSh, focuses on program, or scripts, that run in the Unix shell. A script is a sequence of commands that instructs a computer to perform a calculation. Correct and automatic parallelization of shell scripts is a thorny problem that researchers have grappled with for decades.

The Unix shell remains popular, in part, because it is the only programming environment that enables one script to be composed of functions written in multiple programming languages. Different programming languages are better suited for specific tasks or types of data; if a developer uses the right language, solving a problem can be much easier.

"People also enjoy developing in different programming languages, so composing all these components into a single program is something that happens very frequently," Vasilakis adds.

While the Unix shell enables multilanguage scripts, its flexible and dynamic structure makes these scripts difficult to parallelize using traditional methods.
Parallelizing a program is usually tricky because some parts of the program are dependent on others. This determines the order in which components must run; get the order wrong and the program fails.

When a program is written in a single language, developers have explicit information about its features and the language that helps them determine which components can be parallelized. But those tools don't exist for scripts in the Unix shell. Users can't easily see what is happening inside the components or extract information that would aid in parallelization.

A just-in-time solution

To overcome this problem, PaSh uses a preprocessing step that inserts simple annotations onto program components that it thinks could be parallelizable. Then PaSh attempts to parallelize those parts of the script while the program is running, at the exact moment it reaches each component.
This avoids another problem in shell programming—it is impossible to predict the behavior of a program ahead of time.

By parallelizing program components "just in time," the system avoids this issue. It is able to effectively speed up many more components than traditional methods that try to perform parallelization in advance.

Just-in-time parallelization also ensures the accelerated program still returns accurate results. If PaSh arrives at a program component that cannot be parallelized (perhaps it is dependent on a component that has not run yet), it simply runs the original version and avoids causing an error.

"No matter the performance benefits—if you promise to make something run in a second instead of a year—if there is any chance of returning incorrect results, no one is going to use your method," Vasilakis says.

Users don't need to make any modifications to use PaSh; they can just add the tool to their existing Unix shell and tell their scripts to use it.

Acceleration and accuracy

The researchers tested PaSh on hundreds of scripts, from classical to modern programs, and it did not break a single one. The system was able to run programs six times faster, on average, when compared to unparallelized scripts, and it achieved a maximum speedup of nearly 34 times.

It also boosted the speeds of scripts that other approaches were not able to parallelize.

"Our system is the first that shows this type of fully correct transformation, but there is an indirect benefit, too. The way our system is designed allows other researchers and users in industry to build on top of this work," Vasilakis says.

He is excited to get additional feedback from users and see how they enhance the system. The open-source project joined the Linux Foundation last year, making it widely available for users in industry and academia.

Moving forward, Vasilakis wants to use PaSh to tackle the problem of distribution—dividing a program to run on many computers, rather than many processors within one computer. He is also looking to improve the annotation scheme so it is more user-friendly and can better describe complex program components.

"Unix shell scripts play a key role in data analytics and software engineering tasks. These scripts could run faster by making the diverse programs they invoke utilize the multiple processing units available in modern CPUs. However, the shell's dynamic nature makes it difficult to
devise parallel execution plans ahead of time," says Diomidis Spinellis, a professor of software engineering at Athens University of Economics and Business and professor of software analytics at Delft Technical University, who was not involved with this research. "Through just-in-time analysis, PaSh-JIT succeeds in conquering the shell's dynamic complexity and thus reduces script execution times while maintaining the correctness of the corresponding results."

"As a drop-in replacement for an ordinary shell that orchestrates steps, but does not reorder or split them, PaSh provides a no-hassle way to improve the performance of big data-processing jobs," adds Douglas McIlroy, adjunct professor in the Department of Computer Science at Dartmouth College, who previously led the Computing Techniques Research Department at Bell Laboratories (which was the birthplace of the Unix operating system). "Hand optimization to exploit parallelism must be done at a level for which ordinary programming languages (including shells) don't offer clean abstractions. The resulting code intermixes matters of logic and efficiency. It's hard to read and hard to maintain in the face of evolving requirements. PaSh cleverly steps in at this level, preserving the original logic on the surface while achieving efficiency when the program is run."

Source

Among the new features in Suse Enterprise Linux 15 Service Pack 4 (SLE 15 SP4) is support for live patching, which will enable organizations to patch a running system without the need for a system reboot. The new Suse Enterprise Linux update also includes support for the latest AMD confidential computing capabilities. Suse is now also among the first enterprise Linux distributions to include open-source Nvidia GPU drivers, which will help to accelerate graphics and AI use cases on Linux systems.

The new release from Suse comes a month after its primary rival in the enterprise Linux space released Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9, which similarly had a strong focus on security. Suse Linux Enterprise 15 Service Pack 4 (SLE 15 SP4), is the fourth major update of Linux vendor’s flagship platform since Suse Enterprise Linux 15 was first released in June 2018. With its enterprise Linux distribution, a major version number change can often be disruptive for users, while a service pack can be easier to update, while still providing new features. Long-term support is a key value proposition that Suse continues to make with its Suse Enterprise Linux platform.

“We will do a service pack five, six and seven for Suse Linux Enterprise 15, so that customers really get innovation without disruption in a fully compatible manner,” Markus Noga, general manager of Linux at Suse told VentureBeat. “We are committing to long-term support options until 2031.”

More confidential computing capabilities come to Suse Linux Enterprise

Confidential Computing is a growing area for hardware security, enabling encryption and access controls on different parts of hardware, and most notable computing silicon. A recent report from Everest Group has forecast that the market for confidential computing capabilities could reach $54 billion by 2026.

Suse first added its initial set of confidential computing capabilities for AMD-based silicon in 2016. Noga explained that in Suse Linux Enterprise 15 Service Pack 4, support has now been added for secure encrypted virtualization. Linux systems are commonly used for virtualized application workloads — having the ability to provide a secured boundary around different workloads is critical.

Noga noted that Suse also continues to support confidential computing efforts from Intel as well, though there aren’t any particularly new updates on that front in the latest update.

“We work with all major silicon vendors on bringing the latest chipset capabilities into the operating system, and with hyperscalers to bring the features into large environments,” Noga said.

Supply chain security gets serious with Google SLSA

Supply chain security has been an ongoing concern in open source in recent years, and it’s an issue that Suse is also dealing with in its new update adding support for the Google Supply chain Levels for Software Artifacts (SLSA) framework at level 4.

“What SLSA does in a really nice way is to lay out an end to end perspective for supply chain security,” Noga said.

Noga explained that Google SLSA level 4 defines an approach that provides visibility into the many parts that constitute an operating system like Suse Linux Enterprise, and its applications. The visibility includes code sources, scripts and version control as well as the build service to understand where code comes from, how it was built and providing verified code signing to help guarantee authenticity.

Another security challenge that Suse is aiming to help solve with its latest update is the ability for enterprises to more easily update running software packages. With many forms of software updates, there is a need to reboot the operating system, which is not an ideal situation for enterprise software that needs to always be running like Linux. Recently, Linux vendors including Suse have enabled the ability to live patch the Linux kernel, which is the foundation of the operating system.

Now in Suse Enterprise Linux 15 Service Pack 4, the Linux vendor is providing a new feature that will enable users to live patch, other core user-facing components of the operating system. Among the components that can now be patched is the OpenSSL cryptographic library, which enables secure connections. OpenSSL is critically important for organizations to have fully patched and updated, as it was the target of one of the most notorious open-source security vulnerabilities of all time with the Heartbleed vulnerability in 2014.

Coming soon: Linux operating system on demand

Looking forward, Suse is looking to build a new way for enterprises to use Linux. It’s an approach that Noga referred to as an operating system as a service.

The basic idea behind the new approach is that organizations are often resource-constrained and don’t have the IT staff to manage Linux operating systems. The in-development Suse Linux operating system as a service aims to provide a fully managed approach that is automated.

“We’re heading in a direction where we provide an operating system as a service, which you can think of as an operating system on-demand,” Noga said.

Source

You’ll be able to schedule an email to send it later. Image: Apple

Apple announced some major new features for Mail that finally bring the email app closer to parity with Gmail and other popular email clients. I personally rely on Mail on Mac for my work emails, and I think I’ll be taking advantage of many of these updates once they’re available.

Perhaps the most useful will be an undo send feature, which will let you call back an email within 10 seconds of hitting the send button. It’s a feature that I’m a big fan of in Gmail, and I’ve used it more than I care to admit to save myself from sharing an embarrassing typo.

A “remind me” feature will let you set a time for an email to come back to the top of your inbox. I already use Gmail’s similar snooze button quite often to earmark emails for the weekend. A new scheduled send feature that allows you to specify exactly when an email should go out. And Mail will even tell you when it thinks you’ve forgotten to include an attachment.

The new Mail features will be available in macOS Ventura, iPadOS 16, and iOS 16 when they’re released this fall. You can see the full list of what’s coming in this screenshot, taken from Apple’s macOS Ventura “All New Features” page.

Here’s what’s coming to Mail. Image: Apple

Apple is finally adding some of Gmail’s best features to its own email apps

The latest Edge update includes a group policy that allows enterprises to restrict the max length of username/password values added to the Edge Password Manager and a delete button for individual apps on the block external app list. However, the delete button is limited to iOS users only. Also, it adds several improvements, bug fixes, and more. You can read the full official changelog below.

Microsoft Edge build 104.0.1271.2 changelog

Meanwhile, Microsoft has finished testing Edge version 103 in the Dev Channel. Insiders in the Dev Channel got to test a lot of new features with version 103, and users have similar expectations from version 104 too. We might see Microsoft rolling out several new features for version 104 builds.

If you want to try these new features before Beta and stable channel users, you can download Microsoft Edge Dev here from the Official Edge Insider website. To update to the latest version of Microsoft Edge, Dev Channel users need to navigate to Help and feedback > About Microsoft Edge. You will see the update here. You need to download and install and then restart the browser to complete the installation.

Microsoft Edge 104.0.1271.2 is now rolling out to Dev Channel Insiders

Internet users have several options when it comes to the transferring of files between devices. From saving files to external storage devices to using online file synchronization services. Soon, Edge users may use Drop, a built-in feature to transfer files between devices using Microsoft's OneDrive service as the backbone infrastructure.

To use Drop, Edge users need to be signed in to a Microsoft Account. It is this Microsoft Account's OneDrive storage that is going to be used for the transfers. The OneDrive account needs to have enough free storage, but that is the only other requirement.

Drop appears as an icon on the Edge sidebar on the right. There is also a preference under Settings > Appearance in Edge that adds the Drop icon to the main toolbar of the browser.

A click opens the Drop interface in Edge. A click on the plus icon opens a local file browser to pick files, which are then uploaded to OneDrive. Drop supports batch file uploads; some media types are displayed as previews in the interface.

A text field is provided to write notes, which can be accessed on all devices that Edge is running on as well.

OneDrive is used for storage. While there is no indication in the Drop interface at the time, Edge creates a new folder on OneDrive for the dropped items. The folder Microsoft Edge Drop Files lists all files that were transferred using Drop.

Notes do not appear in the folder, and it is possible that these are synced using Microsoft Edge's syncing capabilities.

Edge users who don't want to use Drop may right-click on the Drop icon to hide it from the sidebar. Not signing in to Edge makes the feature inaccessible as well.

Closing Words

Drop integrates OneDrive file transfers in the Edge browser. Some users may find the added option comfortable, especially if they use Edge a lot. Others may point out that it is easy enough to add files to the OneDrive folder on the device to transfer the files.

Drop supports the sending of notes, which OneDrive does not support in that way. Users could create text documents and add notes to them, or use other means, e.g., writing notes on paper, instead.

An option to attach notes to uploaded files may be useful to some users, but this is not supported at the time.

Some Microsoft Edge users may find Drop useful, as it makes sending files and notes between devices a bit easier, especially on mobile. File restrictions of OneDrive apply, including that certain types of files are prohibited from being uploaded to the service.

Now You: do you find file transfer functionality baked into the browser useful?

Microsoft Edge Drop: transfer files between all Edge instances on all devices

And in light of that, it may soon be possible to run Microsoft's Windows 11 natively on Apple M1 and other Apple Silicon hardware according to a developer Arminder Singh, who is working on a project to make that possible. But these are very early days, and Singh has thrown caution to the wind stating that there are several challenges one must overcome. In his blog post he says:

Contrary to how it may appear on the surface, Apple’s chips are architecturally very different from standard ARM64 chips from companies like Qualcomm or MediaTek and a lot of hardware enablement needs to be done as a result. Thankfully a lot of work has already been done in this area for Linux through the Asahi Linux project

This is not going to be a trivial project to finish, there’s a lot of Apple specific oddities I must account for and things I need to do to ensure the M1 is able to boot Windows in a stable way.

For those wondering what the Asahi Linux project is, it's a similar project which aims to run Linux on Apple Silicon.

However, as mentioned above, there are specific challenges Apple hardware presents. Singh has explained that the major issue is related to Apple's proprietary interrupt controller dubbed Apple Interrupt Controller (AIC). The second problem is related to M1's Input-Output Memory Management Unit (IOMMU) which only supports 16K pages and not 8K.

With such roadblocks, Singh has reiterated that the project may not succeed though he is working actively to bypass these obstacles. Hence, there is no ETA at the moment.

This project is not guaranteed to be successful. I’ll do my best to ensure it goes to completion but ultimately, there is zero guarantee that I will be able to get Windows working in a great way by the end of it all. But I’m going to try my absolute hardest.

I’ll need time to make sure everything works properly so there’s no ETA on anything thus far.

You can find more details on Arminder Singh's blog post here.

Via: Deskmodder

Windows 11 may soon natively run on Apple M1 and more thanks to this new project

macOS 13 Ventura dumps all pre-2017 Macs, including the “trash can” Mac Pro

Apple

Apple announces macOS 13 Ventura, the next major software update for the Mac

Today, the company has touted more impressive gains for its browser, saying that Chrome on Mac is now 20% faster than it was in March.
This news comes from a rather low-key tweet by the official Chrome Twitter account:

Speed has shaped our work since #Chrome’s launch in 2008. Three months ago, we recorded the highest score on Apple’s Speedometer — and now, Chrome is 20% faster on Mac, scoring over 360. pic.twitter.com/FO3t06c9p3
 — Chrome (@googlechrome) June 5, 2022

As can be seen, Chrome has reportedly scored over 360 this time, which is a 20% increase over the 300 it scored three months ago with Chrome 99.

That said, due to the lack of a dedicated blog post, the details regarding the performance improvements are unclear. We do know that Safari scored 277 last time, and we can assume that it's Chrome 102 - released a couple of weeks ago - that has scored 360 points this time.

While we wait for further information, we should recap that the performance benefits in Chrome 99 were due to the ThinLTO build optimization technique, the V8 Sparkplug compiler, and short builtin calls. It remains to be seen what changes have led to the latest gains.

Source

Linus Torvalds has announced the first release candidate for version 5.19 of the Linux kernel, and declared it represents a milestone in multiplatform development for the project.

After first commenting that the development process for this version has been made difficult by many late pull requests, then applauding the fact that most were properly signed, Torvalds opined that Linux 5.19 "is going to be on the bigger side, but certainly not breaking any records, and nothing looks particularly odd or crazy."

Around 60 percent of the release is drivers, and there's another big load of code that gets AMD GPUs playing nicely with the kernel.

Torvalds also noted "the core module handling got split up into more manageable pieces rather than one big file."

He signed off his weekly update with the following observation:

One thing of note is how the long-time ARM generic kernel work (aka "multiplatform") is pretty much done after 10+ years. Congrats to everybody involved. The StrongARM platforms remain with their separate kernels, and are expected to stay so, but compared to where things were a decade ago, this is a pretty big step.

Among the new additions to Linux 5.19 are work to support the MIPS-based LoongArch64 architecture developed by Chinese chip outfit LongSoon, NVMe support for Apple silicon, and more code that lays the groundwork for Intel's standalone GPUs.

Another item of interest is the beginnings of support for the HPE GXP architecture.

As explained by HPE chap Nick Hawkins, the architecture uses ARMv7 and the Cortex A9 core and will become a key feature of the company's next-gen servers.

But not as CPU.

"The GXP is the HPE BMC SoC that is used in the majority of HPE Generation 10 servers," Hawkins wrote. "Traditionally the ASIC will last multiple generations of server before being replaced." ®

Source

Apple mainly uses its WWDC keynote address, which will be live-streamed at 1 p.m. Eastern (10 a.m. Pacific), to highlight new developments to the software that runs its iPhones, iPads, computers and smartwatches.

But as chatter about the metaverse continues to grow, many fans and industry observers also expect Apple to reveal that it is working on a “mixed-reality” headset — a kind of wearable display meant to blend digital objects and environments with your view of the real world.

Apple isn’t alone in exploring the benefits of mixed reality; Microsoft’s Windows 10 and 11 operating systems already support MR headsets and Facebook-owned Meta started teasing its powerful “Project Cambria” headset late last year. Even so, some view this new kind of product as crucial to a company that refreshes existing products more than it invents new ones.

“AR/VR technology will be a key broadening out of the Apple ecosystem as the company aggressively goes after the metaverse opportunity with Apple Glass,” wrote Daniel Ives, an analyst at Wedbush Securities, in an investor note.

A surprise hardware reveal at a software show wouldn’t necessarily be out of character for Apple. The company has routinely used WWDC to reveal new gadgetry for the first time, although a steady stream of leaks has made true surprises hard to come by for many years.

In 2017, attendees got an early peek at the Siri-powered HomePod, a premium smart home speaker that struggled to catch on but begot a cheap spinoff. Two years after that, Apple revealed the expensive Mac Pro, a high-powered workstation that bore a passing resemblance to a cheese grater on wheels.

Apple observers think the chances of glimpsing a wearable display during the course of Monday’s keynote is unlikely. A Bloomberg report published earlier this year suggested that the company would likely push back the official reveal of the headset until later in 2022, if not the following year. More recently, Ming-Chi Kuo, an analyst with TF International Securities with a record of accurate Apple predictions, cast doubt on the notion of a headset reveal at WWDC on Twitter.

“I’m sure that if Apple announces AR/MR headset and its OS at WWDC, competitors will immediately kick off copycat projects and happily copy Apple’s excellent ideas, and hit the store shelves before Apple launches in 2023,” he wrote.

Apple declined to comment on its product plans.

While it’s possible the company will discuss the software that eventually powers this new device, Apple will probably stick to the bread and butter of its conference keynotes: new software feature announcements for the rest of its products.

iOS, which powers the company’s iPhones, is expected to contain multiple new features, including new accessibility tools Apple publicly described last month. Meanwhile, iPads may be in for some more foundational changes.

One report claims that the new version of iPadOS will give Apple’s tablets more flexibility in the way they display multiple running apps. Such a feature could make iPads more capable replacements for traditional computers, though Samsung’s smartphones and tablets already have an edge there.

Additional announcements expected at the show include an improved power saving feature for the Apple Watch meant to extend its battery life, as reported by Bloomberg, as well as more sophisticated heart monitoring tools for the wearable. The software that powers Apple’s tiny set-top box and personal computers also regularly gets its moments in the spotlight, though it’s not yet clear what new features will be included.

And maybe, just maybe, Apple will have hardware to announce, after all. Reports suggest the company plans to follow up on last year’s well-received line of MacBook Pros with an updated version of its popular MacBook Air laptop.

We’ll be updating this story as the live Apple event unfolds.

Source

The left sidebar on the desktop, and the bottom sidebar on mobile, now have large buttons for Chat, Space, and Meet, three services Google would very much like you to start using.

Google via Justin Pot

A chonky sidebar with four buttons takes up a lot of space, seemingly just to remind Gmail users that Google offers videoconferencing and chat services. It's even worse on the mobile version, where the chonkbar constantly lives on the bottom of the screen. It's a lot of clutter, I'm tired of seeing it, and I don't think I'm alone.

You could take this as an opportunity to replace Gmail with a privacy-first email provider, but I understand not everyone wants to switch email addresses. With that in mind, here's how to keep your Gmail address without having to look at the chonky Gmail user interface—or, if you prefer, how to hide the chonkbar so you can get back to enjoying Gmail.

It's okay if you forgot about email clients—we all did. It's time to remember, though, because they show you your emails and otherwise stay out of your way. Here's a few I like:

1. On Apple devices, the default Mail app is clean, fast, and even blocks email tracking by default.
2. On Windows, there's the default Mail app, which is very clean and stays out of your way.
3. Outlook is really good now, and it's included if you're already paying for Microsoft Office. The mobile version, in particular, is much cleaner than Gmail in many ways, and it's a pretty nice calendar app too.
4. Thunderbird is still a very good open source email client for all desktop operating systems.
5. Canary is a clean, fast, secure email client for Windows, Android, and Apple devices. You can optionally use the default Gmail keyboard shortcuts, which is a big deal if you're a longtime Gmail power user.

All of these applications make it easy to add a Gmail account after installing, so you can try out a few and see what you like best. And everything will sync between these clients and Gmail, so you can use both at once for a while if that helps.

It might take a little getting used to, granted, but after a few months of using Apple Mail full-time I don't really miss Gmail at all.

If an email client isn't exactly what you're looking for, you can kind-of-sort-of get the old Gmail layout back. Click the gear icon in Gmail and then click More Settings. Head to the Chat and Meet tab, then choose Classic Hangouts as your chat option.

Google via Justin Pot

Click Save Changes and the left-hand icons for Chat, Spaces, and Meet—along with the chonkbar they live on—will disappear. You can also select Hide the Meet Section in the main menu to free up some more vertical space for your various labels. On mobile, you need to head to the settings for your account, scroll down a lot, and uncheck the Chat and Meet options. Do that and the chonkbar will be banished on mobile. (If you have more than one account, you will have to repeat this for every one of them.)

It's a good reminder of why you should always question the default settings. It's nice that these issues can be fixed, but I'd rather just stop using an interface that's part of a growth-hacking scheme.

This isn't the first time Google's done something like this. In 2010 Google crammed a social network called Google Buzz into Gmail and automatically added frequent contacts as friends, resulting in at least one person getting updates from their abusive ex. People weren't pleased, to say the least, and Google shut down the service less than two years later after numerous privacy lawsuits sullied the name.

I'd like to live in a world where a nice email app can just be a nice email app—a world where companies don't try to leverage user bases to accomplish some other corporate aim. I don't think I'm alone.

Gmail Is Kind of a Mess. Here’s How to Fix It

(May require free registration to view)