There's been a few complaints about Amazon's drone delivery service. "The automated mailmen are dropping off packages from 10 feet in the air," reports the New York Post, "rendering the contents of each box susceptible to crashing and smashing."
One example? Tamara Hancock filmed a drone delivering a bottle of Torani flavoring syrup to her home in Arizona (as a test of how Amazon handled fragile items). It was delivered it in a plastic bottle — not glass — but the massive drone drops the drone from so high that the impact cracked the bottle's cap. (In the video Hancock opens her delivery to find leaked flavoring syrup "everywhere.")

The delivery was hard to film, Hancock says, because "If the drone sees me in the back yard, it will not drop, because it is worried about hurting humans or animals." The Post notes Amazon's "AI-charged fleet" of drones are "Outfitted with industry-leading 'sense and avoid' technology, the aerodynamic machines are equipped to drop off eligible items, weighing a maximum of five pounds, at designated areas in 60 minutes or less."
The high-tech, however, apparently does not ensure gentle landings. Collisions, including a recent crash-and-burn into a Texas building, as well as several mid-flight malfunctions in rainy weather, have abounded since the drones' inaugural launch....

Tasha, a separate Amazon user, spotted the drone plunging a package near the paved driveway of a neighbor's yard. Unfortunately, its propellers caused other, previously delivered parcels to blow away, sending one into the street... In a statement to The Post, Amazon said it apologized for one of the "rare instances when products don't arrive as expected."
Amazon's drone fleet has been running since late 2024, the Post adds, and are now offering "ultra-fast" shipping in U.S. states including Arizona, Florida, Michigan, Kansas and Texas.
The machines do seem massive. I'm surprised neighbors aren't complaining about the noise...

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/0729233/videos-catch-amazon-delivery-drones-dropping-packages-from-10-feet-in-the-air?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Тихо и незаметно вышла распределенная операционная система Inferno64 – современная переработка классической ОС Inferno, ориентированная на 64-битные платформы (amd64/arm64) и запуск в том числе поверх Linux.

Проект позиционируется как «распределённая вычислительная среда нового поколения»: система объединяет разнородные устройства (старые ноутбуки, телефоны, десктопы) в единую peer-to-peer вычислительную сеть. В основе лежит классическая модель Inferno с файловым представлением ресурсов и протоколом 9P.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/18271204#cut ) )

После 6 месяцев разработки представлен релиз среды рабочего стола LXQt 2.4.0 (Qt Lightweight Desktop Environment), продолжающей развитие проектов LXDE и Razor-qt.

Интерфейс LXQt следует идеям классической организации рабочего стола, но привносит современное оформление и приёмы, увеличивающие удобство работы. LXQt позиционируется как лёгкое, модульное, быстрое и удобное окружение, вобравшее лучшие черты LXDE и Razor-qt. Код размещён на GitHub и поставляется под лицензиями GPL 2.0+ и LGPL 2.1+.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/linux-general/18271226#cut ) )

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: The winning runner at a Beijing half-marathon for humanoid robots finished the race today in 50 minutes and 26 seconds -- significantly faster than the human world record of 57 minutes recently set by Jacob Kiplimo. [...] [T]he winning time is a massive improvement over last year's race, when the fastest robot finished in two hours and 40 minutes.

The Associated Press reports that this year's winner was built by Chinese smartphone maker Honor. It seems the winning robot wasn't actually the fastest, as a different Honor robot finished in 48 minutes and 19 seconds. But that one was remote controlled -- the 50:26 robot was autonomous and won due to weighted scoring. About 40% of participating robots competed autonomously, while the remaining 60% were remote controlled, according to Beijing's E-Town tech hub. Not all of them did as well as Honor's robots, with one robot falling at the starting line and another hitting a barrier.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/0346215/robots-beat-human-records-at-beijing-half-marathon?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Axios reports that the NSA is using Anthropic's restricted Mythos Preview model despite the Pentagon insisting the company poses a "supply chain risk." Axios reports: The government's cybersecurity needs appear to be outweighing the Pentagon's feud with Anthropic. The department moved in February to cut off Anthropic and force its vendors to follow suit. That case is ongoing. The military is now broadening its use of Anthropic's tools while simultaneously arguing in court that using those tools threatens U.S. national security.

Two sources said the NSA was using Mythos, while one said the model was also being used more widely within the department. It's unclear how the NSA is currently using Mythos, but other organizations with access to the model are using it predominantly to scan their own environments for exploitable security vulnerabilities.

Anthropic restricted access to Mythos to around 40 organizations, contending that its offensive cyber capabilities were too dangerous to allow for a wider release. Anthropic only announced 12 of those organizations. One source said the NSA was among the unnamed agencies with access. The NSA's counterparts in the U.K. have said they have access to the model through the country's AI Security Institute. Anthropic's CEO met with top U.S. officials on Friday to discuss "opportunities for collaboration," according to a White House spokesperson, "as well as shared approaches and protocols to address the challenges associated with scaling this technology."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/0353220/nsa-using-anthropics-mythos-despite-blacklist?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg, written by writer Austin Carr: Allbirds is pivoting to artificial intelligence. The San Francisco brand, whose wool running shoes were once the sneaker du jour among the tech crowd, announced last week that it was expanding into AI computing infrastructure. The bizarre strategic shift was immediately greeted with a surprising frenzy on Wall Street, where shares of Allbirds soared 582% last Wednesday before dropping the next day. [...] Of course, the absurdity of Allbirds' situation echoed familiar Silicon Valley tropes -- from the endless startup pivots of the 2010s to the more recent boom-and-bust cycles of arbitrarily valued crypto coins. But it immediately reminded me of the marketing ploys of the dot-com crash. After all, some of the more iconic fails ended up being retailers such as Pets.com, Webvan, etc., riding the web wave with little to show for it beyond terrible margins.

One particular comparison from that period stands out as relevant to Allbirds: Zap.com. The holding company behind it, Zapata Corp., had a long and convoluted history, but was essentially selling fish-oil products by the time it decided to reinvent itself as an internet portal. It amassed a variety of web properties -- in media, e-commerce, gaming and so on -- and even once tried to acquire the search engine Excite. Spoiler alert: Zap flopped. Jen Heck, then a young employee at one of Zap's up-and-coming portfolio entities, remembers how quickly the hype of that web 1.0 turned to hell. As absurd as Zapata's pivot sounds today, it seemed feasible during the excitement of the internet revolution. "We went from like, 'Wow, this life thing is just so easy,' to it all ending so suddenly," Heck recalls. The ones who survived that tech bubble, she says, actually had differentiated products and the right creative thinkers building them -- and weren't just cynically jumping on the latest hot trend. "'Internet' was the magic word then, and 'AI' is the magic word now," Heck says.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/1647258/allbirds-move-to-ai-has-echoes-of-the-dot-com-frenzy?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

DeanonymizedCoward writes: Engadget reports that Palantir has posted to X a summary of CEO Alex Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska's 2025 book, The Technological Republic, which reads like a utopian idealist doodled on a Bond villain's whiteboard. While the post makes some decent points, it also highlights the Big-AI attitude that the AI surveillance state is in fact a good thing, and strongly implies that the Good Guys need to do war crimes before the Bad Guys get around to it. "The ability of free and democratic societies to prevail requires something more than moral appeal," one of the 22 points states. "It requires hard power, and hard power in this century will be built on software."

The book is billed as "a passionate call for the West to wake up to our new reality," and other excerpts in the social media post include assertions such as: "Free email is not enough. The decadence of a culture or civilization, and indeed its ruling class, will be forgiven only if that culture is capable of delivering economic growth and security for the public"; "National service should be a universal duty"; "The postwar neutering of Germany and Japan must be undone"; and "Some cultures have produced vital advances; others remain dysfunctional and regressive."

The statement criticizes the West's resistance to "defining national cultures in the name of inclusivity," as well as the treatment of billionaires and the "ruthless exposure of the private lives of public figures."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/1654212/palantir-posts-bond-villain-manifesto-on-x?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

"After a Supreme Court of the United States ruling in Feb. 2026, many tariffs imposed by the Trump administration were declared illegal because the president overstepped his authority," writes Slashdot reader hcs_$reboot. "As a result, the U.S. government now has to refund a massive amount of money, around $160-170+ billion, paid mainly by importers." According to the New York Times, the administration has now begun accepting refund requests, "surrendering its prized source of revenue -- plus interest." From the report: For some U.S. businesses, the highly anticipated refunds could be substantial, offering critical if belated financial relief. Tariffs are taxes on imports, so the president's trade policies have served as a great burden for companies that rely on foreign goods. Many have had to choose whether to absorb the duties, cut other costs or pass on the expenses to consumers. By Monday morning, those companies can begin to submit documentation to the government to recover what they paid in illegal tariffs.

In a sign of the demand, more than 3,000 businesses, including FedEx and Costco, have already sued the Trump administration in a bid to secure their refunds, with some cases filed even before the Supreme Court's ruling. But only the entities that officially paid the tariffs are eligible to recover that money. That means that the fuller universe of people affected by Mr. Trump's policies -- including millions of Americans who paid higher prices for the products they bought -- are not able to apply for direct relief.

The extent to which consumers realize any gain hinges on whether businesses share the proceeds, something that few have publicly committed to do. Some have started to band together in class-action lawsuits in the hopes of receiving a payout. Many business owners said they weren't sure how easy the tariff refund process would be, particularly given Mr. Trump's stated opposition to returning the money. The administration has suggested that it may be months before companies see any money. Adding to the uncertainty, the White House has declined to say if it might still try to return to court in a bid to halt some or all of the refunds. The money will mostly go to importers and companies, since they were the ones that directly paid the tariffs. While individual refunds with interest could take around 60 to 90 days to process, the overall effort will probably move much more slowly because of how large and complicated it will be.

There are also legal questions around whether companies would have to pass any of that money on to consumers. Slashdot reader AmiMoJo commented: "This is perhaps the biggest transfer of wealth in American history. Most of those companies will just pocket the refund and not pass any of it on to the consumer. If prices go down at all, they won't be back to pre-tariff levels. You paid the tariffs, but you ain't getting the refund."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/1711231/trump-administration-begins-refunding-166-billion-in-tariffs?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Дистрибутив Arch Linux обеспечил воспроизводимую сборку образов контейнеров, позволяющую убедиться, что поставляемые в образе бинарные файлы собраны из предоставляемого исходного кода и не содержат скрытых изменений. Воспроизводимые образы Arch Linux размещены в Docker Hub с тегом repro. Любой желающий может собрать из исходного кода образ контейнера бит в бит совпадающий с распространяемыми проектом готовыми образами, и убедиться, что сборочная инфраструктура дистрибутива, компилятор и сборочный инструментарий не скомпрометированы.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65247

Deezer says AI-generated songs now make up 44% of all new uploads to its platform, with nearly 75,000 arriving each day and more than two million per month. The company notes that consumption of these tracks is still very low, "between 1-3% of the total streams," and 85% are flagged as fraudulent. TechCrunch reports: The latest figure from Deezer highlights a continuous surge in AI-generated music uploads to the platform. Deezer reported receiving around 60,000 AI tracks per day in January, up from 50,000 in November, 30,000 in September, and just 10,000 in January 2025, when it first launched its AI-music detection tool.

Songs tagged as AI-generated on Deezer are automatically removed from algorithmic recommendations and not included in editorial playlists. The company announced today that it will no longer store hi-res versions of AI tracks. "AI-generated music is now far from a marginal phenomenon and as daily deliveries keep increasing, we hope the whole music ecosystem will join us in taking action to help safeguard artists' rights and promote transparency for fans," said Deezer CEO Alexis Lanternier in a press release. "Thanks to our technology and the proactive measures we put in place more than a year ago, we have shown that it's possible to reduce AI-related fraud and payment dilution in streaming to a minimum."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/1947211/deezer-says-44-of-songs-uploaded-to-its-platform-daily-are-ai-generated?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Разработчики библиотеки SDL (Simple DirectMedia Layer) приняли правила, запрещающие приём изменений, содержащих код, сгенерированный большими языковыми моделями, такими как ChatGPT.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65216

Компания Canonical представила релиз Mir 2.26.0 — новой версии композитора и набора библиотек для построения оболочек и графических сред на базе Wayland.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/ubuntu/18268559#cut ) )

Alex Bores, a former Palantir employee and current Democratic House candidate in New York, is proposing an "AI dividend" that would send direct payments to Americans if AI drives major job losses. "At its core, the AI Dividend is simple: if AI dramatically increases productivity and concentrates wealth, the American people have a stake in those gains," a memo on the policy reads. Axios reports: The dividend would fund direct payments to Americans. It would also be invested into workforce training and education, as well as government capacity to "govern AI safely and fund independent oversight," per the plan memo.

"You don't take out fire insurance because you expect your house to burn down -- you have insurance in case something goes awry," Bores told Axios in an interview. "Here we have, for the first time, a technology where the makers of the technology are explicitly saying that their goal is to replace all human labor." "The fact that they've put it out there means government needs to take it seriously." [...]

The proposal would be funded through:
- A token tax, described in the memo as a "modest tax on AI consumption"
- Equity participation in frontier AI firms
- Changes to the tax code that would reduce incentives to invest in AI "when it leads to less work" "If [AI companies] they can support this plan, that would show that they actually believe in what they're putting out there," Bores said. "If they're not doing it, then I think it shows that they're really putting window dressing out there."

Further reading: Palantir Posts Bond Villain Manifesto On X

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/204204/former-palantir-employee-running-for-congress-unveils-ai-dividend-plan?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Apple announced that Tim Cook will step down as CEO in September after 15 years in the role, handing the job to hardware chief John Ternus. Longtime Slashdot reader sinij shares the news from MarketWatch: Cook leaves an impressive legacy after growing the company to a $4 trillion market capitalization from just $300 billion 15 years ago. Over Cook's 15-year tenure as CEO, Apple's stock has risen 1,932%, beating the S&P 500's 504% increase, according to Dow Jones Market Data. That places Apple's stock as the 38th best-performing member of the index over that period of time.

Cook had big shoes to fill, replacing Apple's iconic founder, Steve Jobs, as CEO. Cook's successor, John Ternus, Apple's senior vice president of hardware engineering, will need to guide Apple's through uncharted waters as the company navigates its artificial-intelligence transition and supply-chain constraints. Cook will remain at Apple as executive chairman. "It has been the greatest privilege of my life to be the CEO of Apple and to have been trusted to lead such an extraordinary company. I love Apple with all of my being, and I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with a team of such ingenious, innovative, creative, and deeply caring people who have been unwavering in their dedication to enriching the lives of our customers and creating the best products and services in the world," said Cook.

"John Ternus has the mind of an engineer, the soul of an innovator, and the heart to lead with integrity and with honor. He is a visionary whose contributions to Apple over 25 years are already too numerous to count, and he is without question the right person to lead Apple into the future. I could not be more confident in his abilities and his character, and I look forward to working closely with him on this transition and in my new role as executive chairman."

As for Ternus' replacement, the role of Chief Hardware Officer will be awarded to Apple executive Johny Srouji. "Srouji, who most recently served as senior vice president of Hardware Technologies, will assume an expanded role leading Hardware Engineering, which John Ternus most recently oversaw, as well as the hardware technologies organization," said Apple in a press release.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://apple.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/221244/apple-ceo-tim-cook-is-stepping-down?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Guardian: A ban on mobile phones in schools in England is to be introduced by the government to ensure that "critical safeguarding legislation" is passed. The government will table an amendment to the children's wellbeing and schools bill in the House of Lords after the bill was held up by peers on opposition benches. It will make existing guidance on mobile phone bans in schools statutory, a move that ministers have resisted until now.

The government had consistently argued that the vast majority of schools had already banned mobile phones, and that there was no need to add a legal requirement. They finally capitulated, however, describing it as "a pragmatic measure" to get the bill through. [...] The bill is regarded by many as the biggest piece of child protection legislation in decades and includes proposals for a compulsory register for children who are not in school, a crackdown on profiteering in children's social care, and a "single unique identifier" to help agencies track a child's welfare.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/2014246/mobile-phones-to-be-banned-in-schools-in-england-under-new-plans?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

A new email from Sony says that PlayStation will require players to verify their age later this year to keep using communication features like messages and voice chat. Insider-Gaming reports: The initiative comes from the goal of providing "safe, age-appropriate experiences for players and families while respecting their privacy" and providing "meaningful control over their gaming experiences." The age-verification process will be implemented globally, and players will need to verify their age to continue using PlayStation communication services, such as messages and voice chat. If the player opts not to verify their age, they can still use other services, such as games, trophies, and the store. Only the communication experience will be affected if you choose not to verify your age. PlayStation didn't provide a date for when players will need to begin the verification process.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://games.slashdot.org/story/26/04/20/2357225/playstation-to-require-age-verification-for-messages-and-voice-chat?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman posted an out-of-this-world iPhone video on Sunday, showing Earth disappear behind the Moon at 8x zoom. "I could barely see the Moon through the docking hatch window but the iPhone was the perfect size to catch the view," said Wiseman, noting that this video is "uncropped, uncut with 8x zoom" and "quite comparable to the view of the human eye." The New York Times says the video marks the first time an "Earthset" has been captured on video.

"We've seen our fair share of remarkable images and videos from NASA's Artemis II mission around the Moon. Some of those were even captured on iPhone," notes 9to5Mac. "But Reid Wiseman, astronaut and commander for the Artemis II mission, just posted a new video that might take the crown for the most impressive yet."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/0012245/iphone-video-shows-earthset-from-space?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Представлен релиз распределенной системы управления исходными текстами Git 2.54. Git отличается высокой производительностью и предоставляет средства нелинейной разработки, базирующиеся на ответвлении и слиянии веток. Для обеспечения целостности истории и устойчивости к изменениям "задним числом" используются неявное хеширование всей предыдущей истории в каждом коммите, а также удостоверение цифровыми подписями разработчиков отдельных тегов и коммитов. Код Git распространяется под лицензией GPLv2+.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65252

Amazon is expanding its Anthropic partnership with a deal to invest up to another $25 billion, while Anthropic commits to spending more than $100 billion on AWS infrastructure over the next decade to power Claude. "Anthropic's commitment to run its large language models on AWS Trainium for the next decade reflects the progress we've made together on custom silicon, as we continue delivering the technology and infrastructure our customers need to build with generative AI," Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said in a statement. CNBC reports: Amazon's investment includes $5 billion into Anthropic now, with up to $20 billion in the future tied to "certain commercial milestones," according to a release. The initial investment is at Anthropic's latest valuation of $380 billion. Anthropic said in the release that it will bring nearly 1 gigawatt total of Trainium2 and Trainium3 capacity online by the end of the year.

With all of the major hyperscalers competing to build out AI capacity as quickly as possible, Amazon said in February that it expects to shell out roughly $200 billion this year on capital expenditures, mostly on AI infrastructure.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/014228/amazon-to-invest-up-to-another-25-billion-in-anthropic?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Denver7: Maryland is poised to become the first state in the country to ban "surveillance pricing." The practice refers to companies using a shopper's personal data, such as browsing history, location, or purchasing behavior, to tailor prices to individual customers. The Protection From Predatory Pricing Act, passed this month and sent to the governor for a signature, would prohibit food retailers and third-party delivery services from using the practice. Violations would be treated as deceptive trade practices under state law, with potential fines and lawsuits. While Consumer Reports called the move "encouraging," it warned that the final version contains "loopholes" that don't fully protect consumers. Some of the exemptions noted in the report include "applying the ban only to the use of personal data to set higher prices without establishing a baseline or standard price; exempting pricing tied to loyalty or membership programs, even if prices are higher; and exempting pricing linked to subscriptions or subscription-based services."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/0115210/maryland-becomes-first-state-to-pass-bill-banning-surveillance-pricing?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Проект LibreSSL объявил о выпуске версии 4.3.0, которая уже доступна на зеркалах OpenBSD.

Это development-выпуск для ветки 4.3.x, поэтому разработчики призывают сообщество к активному тестированию. Дальнейших изменений API и ABI в ветке 4.3 не планируется.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/bsd/18270274#cut ) )

21 апреля 2026 года Oracle объявила о выходе нового релиза системы виртуализации VirtualBox 7.2.8.

Основные изменения:

• Исправлена ошибка, вызывавшая «Guru Meditation» с кодом VERR_IEM_IPE_4. Проблема возникала, когда гостевая ОС пыталась выполнить некорректную инструкцию гипервызова, но вместо этого генерировала исключение #UD.

• Исправлена проблема, из-за которой внутренний DNS-сервер мог быть недоступен.

• Исправлена ошибка в Ubuntu 25.10 / Wayland, из-за которой форма курсора мыши не менялась в зависимости от контекста.

• Исправлен критический сбой при выключении FreeBSD 16.0, если к контроллеру LSI Logic SAS было подключено несколько устройств.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/18271996#cut ) )

The IEA says 2025 marked a turning point for global energy, with solar posting the largest growth ever seen for any energy source and helping carbon-free power outpace rising demand. The trend led the agency to declare that the world has entered the "Age of Electricity." Ars Technica reports: The IEA report covers energy use, including the electrical grid, transportation, home heating, and other forms of consumption. As such, it can track how some of those uses are shifting, as electric vehicles displace some gasoline use and heat pumps replace gas and oil heating. It also saw a more global trend: The demand for electricity grew at twice the rate of overall energy demand. All of these went into the conclusion that we're starting the Age of Electricity. In terms of specifics, the IEA saw electric vehicle demand rise by nearly 40 percent, with electric car sales being a quarter of the total of cars sold last year. While that's having a measurable effect on electricity demand, it remains relatively small at the moment. It's almost certain to be contributing to the size of the rise in oil use last year: 0.7 percent. In absolute terms, that's less than half the average rise of the previous decade.

[...] When it comes to supplying electrons for those alternatives, the central story is solar power. "The absolute increase of solar PV generation in 2025 is the largest ever observed for any source," the IEA says, "excluding years marked by rebounds from global economic shocks such as COVID-19." In other words, with nothing in particular driving the energy markets in 2025, Solar's growth was unprecedented. On its own, its growth covered a quarter of the rising demand for all forms of energy. If you limit it to electricity, increased solar production covered over two-thirds of the increased demand. Overall, solar generated over 2,700 terawatt-hours last year, more than double its output from three years earlier. It now accounts for over 8 percent of the world's total electricity production. Thirty individual countries installed at least a gigawatt of solar last year, and it is now the single largest grid source by capacity (though other sources still outproduce it at the moment).

[ Read more of this story ]( https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/1549243/global-growth-in-solar-the-largest-ever-observed-for-any-source?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Состоялся релиз web-браузера Firefox 150 и сформированы обновления прошлых веток с длительным сроком поддержки - 140.10.0 и 115.35.0. На стадию бета-тестирования в ближайшие часы будет переведена ветка Firefox 151, релиз которой намечен на 19 мая.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65260

Microsoft is cutting the monthly price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass, but the tradeoff is that new Call of Duty releases will no longer arrive on the service at launch. Instead, they'll show up about a year later. The Verge reports: After Xbox CEO Asha Sharma admitted last week that "Game Pass has become too expensive for players," Microsoft is dropping the price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass. Starting today, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate drops from $29.99 to $22.99 a month, and PC Game Pass moves to $13.99, down from $16.49 a month.

The price drops are being fueled in part by future of Call of Duty titles no longer joining Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass at launch. "New Call of Duty games will be added to Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass during the following holiday season (about a year later), while existing Call of Duty titles already in the library will continue to be available," says Microsoft.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://games.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/1639222/xbox-game-pass-ultimate-gets-a-price-cut?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

После шести с половиной лет разработки опубликован релиз пакета NTFS-3G 2026.2.25, включающего свободный драйвер, работающий в пространстве пользователя с использованием механизма FUSE, и комплект утилит ntfsprogs для манипуляций с разделами NTFS. Код проекта распространяется под лицензией GPLv2.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65262

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: At Google, leaders are anxious about falling behind in the race to offer AI coding tools, especially as rivals like Anthropic PBC offer more effective and popular tools to businesses, according to people familiar with the matter. The search giant is now working to unite some of its coding initiatives under one banner to speed progress and take advantage of a surge in customer interest. In some corners of Alphabet's Google, particularly AI lab DeepMind, concerns about the company's position are mounting, according to current and former employees and executives, who declined to be named because they weren't authorized to speak publicly.

Businesses are just starting to realize that AI coding tools can enable anyone to build products by prompting a chatbot. But Google doesn't have a clear solution for them. Its Gemini model's capabilities are sprinkled across half a dozen different coding products with different branding, indicating how the company's lack of focus and competing internal efforts have hampered success, the people said. Even internally, some Google engineers prefer to use Anthropic's Claude Code, they said. More concerning, the people said, are the engineers who are struggling to adopt AI coding at all. [...] Google's emphasis on its own technology has also complicated the push to catch up. Most employees are banned from using competing tools such as Claude Code or Codex due to security concerns, but Googlers can request exceptions if they can demonstrate they have a business case, one former employee said. Some teams at DeepMind, including those working on the Gemini model, internal applications, and open source models, use Claude Code, according to three former employees. "You want the best people to use the best tool, even inside Google," one of the former employees said. [...]

In recent years, DeepMind has tried to tighten control over how its AI breakthroughs are woven into Google products. Last year, Google appointed Kavukcuoglu to a new position as chief AI architect, a role in which he is charged with folding generative AI into Google products. Yet confusion about who is leading the charge on AI coding persists. Along with DeepMind, Google Cloud, Google Core, Google Labs and Android are all pushing AI coding in different ways, one of the people said. [...] Within the Googleplex, there is a philosophical clash between AI researchers who want to move as quickly as possible and more traditional senior engineers who have exacting standards for code quality, former employees say. AI usage is factored into performance reviews, according to a former employee. But engineers who try to use internal AI coding tools often hit capacity constraints due to competition for computing power, the former employee said.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://developers.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/1655253/googles-internal-politics-leave-it-playing-catch-up-on-ai-coding?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

[ Представлен ]( https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/xmqqa4uxsjrs.fsf@gitster.g/ ) релиз распределенной системы управления исходными текстами [ Git 2.54 ]( http://git-scm.com/ ) . Git отличается высокой производительностью и предоставляет средства нелинейной разработки, базирующиеся на ответвлении и слиянии веток. Для обеспечения целостности истории и устойчивости к изменениям «задним числом» используются неявное хеширование всей предыдущей истории в каждом коммите, а также удостоверение цифровыми подписями разработчиков отдельных тегов и коммитов. Код Git [ распространяется ]( https://github.com/git/git/ ) под лицензией GPLv2+.

По сравнению с прошлым выпуском в новую версию принято 770 изменений, подготовленных при участии 137 разработчиков (66 впервые приняли участие в разработке Git).

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/development/18271848#cut ) )

Reuters reports that Meta plans to start collecting U.S.-based employees' mouse movements, clicks, keystrokes, and occasional screen snapshots to train AI agents that can better learn how humans use computers. The tool, called Model Capability Initiative (MCI), will reportedly "not be used for performance assessments or any other purpose besides model training and that safeguards were in place to protect 'sensitive content.'" From the report: Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth told employees in a separate memo shared on Monday that the company would step up internal data collection as part of those "AI for Work" efforts, now re-branded as Agent Transformation Accelerator (ATA). "The vision we are building towards is one where our agents primarily do the work and our role is to direct, review and help them improve," Bosworth said. The aim, he added, was for agents to "automatically see where we felt the need to intervene so they can be better next time." Bosworth did not explicitly spell out how those agents would be trained, but said Meta would be "rigorous" about "building up data and evals for all the types of interactions we have as we go about our work."

Meta spokesperson Andy Stone acknowledged that the MCI data would be among the inputs. [...] "If we're building agents to help people complete everyday tasks using computers, our models need real examples of how people "actually use them -- things like mouse movements, clicking buttons, and navigating dropdown menus," said Stone.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/1849217/meta-to-start-capturing-employee-mouse-movements-keystrokes-for-ai-training-data?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Firms like Bank of America, Citi, Wells Fargo, and others are reporting strong profits while reducing head count and automating more work. "All of them credited A.I. to some degree ... in areas ranging from the so-called back office, where tens of thousands of employees fill out paperwork to comply with various laws and regulations, to the front office, where seven-figure salaried professionals put together complicated financial transactions for corporate clients," reports the New York Times. From the report: Less than four months ago, Bank of America's chief executive, Brian T. Moynihan, volunteered in a TV interview what he would say to his 210,000 employees about the chance of artificial intelligence replacing human work. "You don't have to worry," he said. "It's not a threat to their jobs." Last week, after Bank of America reported $8.6 billion in profit for the first quarter -- $1.6 billion more than the same period a year earlier -- Mr. Moynihan struck a different tone. The bank's bottom line, he said, was helped by shedding 1,000 jobs through attrition by "eliminating work and applying technology," which he repeatedly specified was artificial intelligence. He predicted more of that in the months and years to come. "A.I. gives us places to go we haven't gone," Mr. Moynihan said.

The veneer of Wall Street's longstanding assertion -- that A.I. will enhance human work, not replace it -- is rapidly peeling away, as evidenced by the current quarterly earnings season. JPMorgan Chase, Citi, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo racked up $47 billion in collective profits, up 18 percent, while shedding 15,000 employees. All of them credited A.I. to some degree with helping cut jobs and automate work in areas ranging from the so-called back office, where tens of thousands of employees fill out paperwork to comply with various laws and regulations, to the front office, where seven-figure salaried professionals put together complicated financial transactions for corporate clients.

Unlike executives in Silicon Valley, few major financial figures are stating outright that A.I. is eliminating jobs. Citi, for example, has pledged to shrink its work force by 20,000 people through what one executive described to financial analysts last week as the company's "productivity and efficiency journey." The bank is paying for A.I. software from Anthropic, Google, Microsoft and OpenAI, to automatically read legal documents, approve account openings, send invoices for trades and organize sensitive customer data, among other tasks, according to public statements by bank executives and two people familiar with Citi's systems. Among the recent job cuts at Citi were scores of employees who were part of the bank's "A.I. Champions and Accelerators" program, according to the two people, who were not permitted by the bank to speak publicly. The program involves Citi employees who perform their day jobs while also working to persuade their colleagues to adopt A.I. technologies.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/194240/job-cuts-driven-by-ai-are-rising-on-wall-street?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Представлен выпуск распределённой СУБД Apache Cloudberry 2.1.0, продолжающей развитие открытой кодовой базы СУБД Greenplum, которая была превращена компанией Broadcom в закрытый продукт после приобретения VMware. Проект пока находится в инкубаторе Apache и будет переведён в число первичных проектов Apache после готовности инфраструктуры и сопровождающих.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65253

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Framework has been selling and shipping its modular, repairable, upgradable Laptop 13 for five years now, and in that time, it has released six distinct versions of its system board, each using fresh versions of Intel and AMD processors (seven versions, if you count this RISC-V one). The laptop around those components has gradually gotten better, too. Over the years, Framework has added higher-resolution screens in both matte and glossy finishes, a slightly larger battery, and other tweaked components that refine the original design. But so far, all of those parts have been totally interchangeable, and the fundamentals of the Laptop 13 design haven't changed much.

That changes today with the Framework Laptop 13 Pro, which, despite its name, is less an offshoot of the original Laptop 13 and closer to a ground-up redesign. It includes new Core Ultra Series 3 chips (codenamed Panther Lake), Framework's first touchscreen, a new black aluminum color option, a larger battery, and other significant changes. And while it sacrifices some component compatibility with the original Laptop 13, displays and motherboards remain interchangeable, so Framework Laptop owners can buy the new Core Ultra board and owners of older Framework Laptop boards can pop one into a Pro to benefit from the new battery and screen. At 1.4kg (about 3 pounds), the Laptop 13 Pro is slightly heavier than the Laptop 13's 1.3kg, but it still stacks up well against the 14-inch M5 MacBook Pro (1.55kg, or 3.4 pounds).

The Framework Laptop Pro will start at $1,199 for a DIY edition with a Core Ultra 5 325 processor, and no RAM, SSD, or operating system. A prebuilt version with Ubuntu Linux installed will start at $1,499, and Windows 11 will cost another $100 on top of that. A Core Ultra X7 358H version starts at $1,599 for a DIY edition, and a "limited batch" Core Ultra X9 388H version starts at $1,799. A bare motherboard with the Core Ultra 5 325 starts at $449, while a Core Ultra X7 358H board will cost $799. Pre-orders are available now, and begin shipping in June.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/2019256/framework-laptop-13-pro-is-a-major-overhaul-for-the-modular-upgradeable-laptop?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

BrianFagioli writes: Mozilla says it used an early version of Anthropic's Claude Mythos Preview to comb through Firefox's code, and the results were hard to ignore. In Firefox 150, the team fixed 271 vulnerabilities identified during this effort, a number that would have been unthinkable not long ago. Instead of relying only on fuzzing tools or human review, the AI was able to reason through code and surface issues that typically require highly specialized expertise.

The bigger implication is less about one release and more about where this is heading. Security has long favored attackers, since they only need to find a single flaw while defenders have to protect everything. If AI can scale vulnerability discovery for defenders, that dynamic could start to shift. It does not mean zero days disappear overnight, but it suggests a future where bugs are found and fixed faster than attackers can weaponize them. "Computers were completely incapable of doing this a few months ago, and now they excel at it," says Mozilla in a blog post. "We have many years of experience picking apart the work of the world's best security researchers, and Mythos Preview is every bit as capable. So far we've found no category or complexity of vulnerability that humans can find that this model can't."

The company concluded: "The defects are finite, and we are entering a world where we can finally find them all."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/2028206/mozilla-uses-anthropics-mythos-to-fix-271-bugs-in-firefox?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Florida's attorney general has launched a criminal investigation into OpenAI over allegations that the accused gunman in a shooting at Florida State University last year used ChatGPT to help plan the attack. OpenAI says the chatbot is "not responsible for this terrible crime" and only provided factual information available from public sources. NPR reports: The Republican attorney general, James Uthmeier, said at a press conference in Tampa on Tuesday that accused gunman Phoenix Ikner consulted ChatGPT for advice before the shooting, including what type of gun to use, what ammunition went with it, and what time to go to campus to encounter more people, according to an initial review of Ikner's chat logs. "My prosecutors have looked at this and they've told me, if it was a person on the other end of that screen, we would be charging them with murder," Uthmeier said. "We cannot have AI bots that are advising people on how to kill others."

Uthmeier's office is issuing subpoenas to OpenAI seeking information about its policies and internal training materials related to user threats of harm and how it cooperates with and reports crimes to law enforcement, dating back to March 2024. At the press conference, Uthmeier acknowledged the investigation is entering into uncharted territory and is uncertain about whether OpenAI has criminal liability. "We are going to look at who knew what, designed what, or should have done what," he said. "And if it is clear that individuals knew that this type of dangerous behavior might take place, that these types of unfortunate, tragic events might take place, and nevertheless still turned to profit, still allowed this business to operate, then people need to be held accountable."

[...] Ikner, 21, is facing multiple charges of murder and attempted murder for the April 2025 shooting near the student union on FSU's Tallahassee campus, where he was a student at the time. His trial is set to begin on Oct. 19. According to court filings, more than 200 AI messages have been entered into evidence in the case.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/2039235/florida-launches-criminal-investigation-into-chatgpt-over-school-shooting?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: SpaceX, Elon Musk's rocket and satellite company, said on Tuesday that it had struck a deal with the artificial intelligence start-up Cursor that could result in its acquiring the young company for $60 billion. SpaceX is making the deal just as it prepares to go public in what is likely to be one of the largest initial public offerings ever. In a social media post, SpaceX said the combination with Cursor, which makes code-writing software, would "allow us to build the world's most useful" A.I. models.

SpaceX added that the agreement gave it the option "to acquire Cursor later this year for $60 billion or pay $10 billion for our work together." It is unclear if the companies plan to consummate the deal before or after SpaceX's I.P.O., which could happen as early as June. [...] Cursor, which has raised more than $3 billion in funding, was founded in 2022 and made waves as a fast-growing A.I. start-up. It was under pressure in recent months after OpenAI and Anthropic announced competing code-writing products that were embraced by tech companies. Cursor had been in talks to raise funding in recent weeks.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://developers.slashdot.org/story/26/04/21/2343219/spacex-strikes-deal-with-coding-startup-cursor-for-60-billion?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

[ Доступен ]( https://download-installer.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/firefox/releases/150.0/ ) Firefox 150.

В числе интересных новшеств — управление расположением открытых страниц, наделение просмотрщика PDF некоторыми функциями редактирования и устранение большого количества уязвимостей, в том числе найденных с помощью нейросетей.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/mozilla/18272148#cut0 ) )

Компания Oracle опубликовала корректирующий релиз системы виртуализации VirtualBox 7.2.8, в котором устранено 9 уязвимостей, подробности о которых пока не раскрываются. Указано только, что 5 наиболее серьёзных проблем имеют уровень опасности 7.5 из 10. Одна из уязвимостей может быть эксплуатирована удалённой по сети. Кроме уязвимостей в новой версии представлено 17 изменений.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65264

Federal authorities are now reviewing a string of deaths and disappearances involving scientists tied to sensitive U.S. aerospace and nuclear work, though officials have not established any confirmed link between the cases. The FBI says it "is spearheading the effort to look for connections into the missing and deceased scientists," adding that it "is working with the Department of Energy, Department of War, and with our state ... and local law enforcement partners to find answers." The Republican-led House Oversight Committee also announced an investigation into the reports. CNN reports: A nuclear physicist and MIT professor fatally shot outside his Massachusetts residence. A retired Air Force general missing from his New Mexico home. An aerospace engineer who disappeared during a hike in Los Angeles. These are among at least 10 individuals connected to sensitive US nuclear and aerospace research who have died or disappeared in recent years, prompting concerns whether they are connected and fueling speculation online about the possibility of nefarious activity. [...]

The Defense Department said only that it would respond to the committee directly, and the Department of Energy referred questions to the White House. In a post on X, NASA said it is "coordinating and cooperating with the relevant agencies" in relation to the scientists. "At this time, nothing related to NASA indicates a national security threat," NASA spokesperson Bethany Stevens said.

The cases vary widely in circumstance. Some involve unsolved homicides, while others are missing persons cases with no signs of foul play. In at least two instances, families have pointed to preexisting medical conditions or personal struggles as explanations. Authorities have not established any links between the cases. The White House said last week it is also working with federal agencies to probe any potential links between the deaths and disappearances, with President Donald Trump referring to the matter as "pretty serious stuff." "The United States has thousands of nuclear scientists and nuclear experts," said Rep. James Walkinshaw, a Democrat who also serves on the Oversight Committee. "It's not the kind of nuclear program that potentially a foreign adversary could significantly impact by targeting 10 individuals."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/04/22/0348204/fbi-looks-into-dead-or-missing-scientists-tied-to-sensitive-us-research?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Компания Oracle опубликовала плановый выпуск обновлений своих продуктов (Critical Patch Update), нацеленный на устранение критических проблем и уязвимостей. В апрельском обновлении устранена 481 уязвимость.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65265

Эндрю Ланн (Andrew Lunn), мэйнтейнер 9 подсистем, отвечающий за сетевые драйверы в ядре Linux, опубликовал набор патчей, удаляющих из ядра все драйверы для Ethernet-адаптеров с интерфейсами ISA и PCMCIA. Отмечается, что ранее старые драйверы не требовали особых усилий по сопровождению, но с появлением продвинутых AI-инструментов и систем fuzzing-тестирования, используемых новичками для выявления ошибок в ядре, нагрузка на сопровождающих увеличилась.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65266

Проект Fedora рассматривает возможность введения статуса проверенного участника (Fedora Verified), который позволит выделить разработчиков, имеющих вклад в развитие проекта и заслуживающих определённых привилегий, таких как возможность участия в принятии решений. До 5 мая проект поводит опрос целесообразности введения особого статуса. Основное причиной обсуждаемых изменений является неопределённость в вопросе, кто может принимать участие голосованиях, проводимых в сообществе.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=65267

NASA's Curiosity rover has identified a diverse set of organic molecules on Mars, including a nitrogen-bearing compound similar in structure to DNA precursors. The finding strengthens the case that ancient organic material can survive in the Martian subsurface, though it does not prove past life because the compounds could also come from geology or meteorites. Phys.org reports: The study was led by Amy Williams, Ph.D., a professor of geological sciences at the University of Florida and a scientist on the Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rover missions. Curiosity landed on Mars in 2012 to find evidence that ancient Mars had conditions that could support microbial life billions of years ago; the Perseverance rover, which landed in 2021, was sent to look for signs of any ancient life that might have formed.

Among the 20-plus chemicals identified by the experiment, Curiosity spotted a nitrogen-bearing molecule with a structure similar to DNA precursors -- a chemical never before spotted on Mars. The rover also identified benzothiophene, a large, double-ringed, sulfurous chemical often delivered to planets by meteorites. "The same stuff that rained down on Mars from meteorites is what rained down on Earth, and it probably provided the building blocks for life as we know it on our planet," Williams said. The findings have been published in the journal Nature Communications.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/26/04/22/0357247/mars-rover-detects-never-before-seen-organic-compounds-in-new-experiment?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

21 апреля состоялся выпуск очередной версии драйвера NTFS-3G FUSE. В основном этот выпуск посвящён исправлениям ошибок.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/hardware/18272382#cut0 ) )

Эндрю Ланн (Andrew Lunn) [ разослал серию исправлений ]( https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20260421-v7-0-0-net-next-driver-removal-v1-v1-0-69517c689d1f@lunn.ch/ ) , чтобы начать удаление ряда сетевых драйверов эпохи ISA и PCMCIA из ядра Linux. Он подробно рассказывает о возникшей в последнее время нагрузке на обслуживание из-за искусственного интеллекта/фаззинга:

«До недавнего времени эти старые драйверы не требовали большого обслуживания. Теперь все больше новичков используют искусственный интеллект, а разработчики fuzzers находят проблемы, что увеличивает нагрузку на разработчиков. Исправлять эти старые драйверы бессмысленно, если не ясно, есть ли у них пользователи.

Все это устройства ISA и PCMCIA Ethernet, в основном прошлого века, пара устройств 2001 или 2002 годов выпуска. Маловероятно, что они все еще используются. Однако удаляйте их по одному патчу за раз, чтобы их можно было восстановить, если у кого-то все еще есть оборудование, работают современные ядра и он хочет взять на себя обязанности сопровождающего драйверов».

Эта серия исправлений удаляет старые драйверы 3com, AMD, SMSC, Cirrus, Fujitsu, Xircom и 8390 Ethernet, что в свою очередь, облегчает работу ядра на 27,6 тыс. строк кода.

https://www.linux.org.ru/news/kernel/18272397

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The US military's massive $1.5 trillion budget request for the next fiscal year includes what Pentagon officials described as the largest investment in drone warfare and counter-drone technology in US history. The proposed spending on drone and autonomous warfare technologies within the FY2027 budget proposal for the US Department of Defense would surpass most countries' defense budgets and rank among the top 10 in the world for military spending, ahead of countries such as Ukraine, South Korea, and Israel.

Specifically, the Pentagon is requesting $53.6 billion to boost US production and procurement of drones, train drone operators, build out a logistics network for sustaining drone deployments, and expand counter-drone systems to defend more US military sites. The funding request is budgeted under the Defense Autonomous Warfare Group (DAWG), an organization established in late 2025 that would see a massive budget increase after receiving about $226 million in the 2026 fiscal year budget.

[...] Another $20.6 billion would help purchase one-way attack drones and drone aircraft developed through the US Air Force's Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, which is building drone prototypes capable of teaming up with human-piloted fighter jets. Part of this funding would also go toward defensive systems for countering small drones and the US Navy's Boeing MQ-25 drone designed to perform midair refueling of carrier-borne fighter aircraft to extend their strike ranges. Such drone-related spending even rivals the entire budget of the US Marine Corps. But the Pentagon has not said that it is creating a dedicated drone branch of the US military similar to the standalone Space Force.

Pentagon officials emphasized that most of the money would go toward procuring drone and autonomous warfare technologies that already exist, and is largely separate from additional funding that would bolster US domestic manufacturing capacity to build such weapon systems. "That $70 billion is all going into existing systems and technologies," said Hurst. "The industrial base support is entirely separate." "The evolution we've seen in the battlefield is this evolution of technologies in the timeframe of weeks, not the typical years we see with our defense production," said Lt. Gen. Steven Whitney, director of force structure, resources, and assessment for the Pentagon's Joint Chiefs of Staff, during a Pentagon press briefing. "So it's really critical we work with industry to get that capability fielded."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/04/22/0411248/pentagon-wants-54-billion-for-drones?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Журналисты тематического издания NotebookCheck обратили внимание на ситуацию с антипиратской защитой Denuvo, включённой в технический состав нашумевшей игры Pragmata.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/games/18272420#cut0 ) )

CATL unveiled a new wave of EV battery tech, "including a lighter battery pack rated for a 1,000-km (621-mile) driving range and an upgraded fast-charging battery that can go from 10 percent to 98 percent in under seven minutes," reports Interesting Engineering. From the report: The launches were made during a 90-minute event in Beijing ahead of the Beijing Auto Show, where automakers are expected to showcase next-generation EVs and connected technologies. CATL said its latest Qilin battery -- a high-energy-density pack often paired with nickel manganese cobalt (NMC) cells for long range and improved space efficiency -- can deliver a 1,000-km (621-mile) driving range. It is designed to deliver long range while reducing battery pack weight.

The company said the product is aimed at automakers facing tighter efficiency rules in China and other markets. It also rolled out an upgraded Shenxing battery -- CATL's fast-charging lithium iron phosphate (LFP) pack -- that targets one of the biggest barriers to EV adoption: charging time. CATL said the pack can recharge from 10 percent to 98 percent in less than seven minutes.

The new Shenxing battery marks a significant improvement over CATL's previous version, which charged from 5 percent to 80 percent in 15 minutes, according to Financial Times. [...] The company also announced plans to begin mass delivery of sodium-ion batteries in the fourth quarter. Sodium-ion technology is seen as a lower-cost alternative that could reduce dependence on lithium, cobalt, and nickel.

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A satirical but working tool called Malus uses AI to create "clean room" clones of open-source software, aiming to reproduce the same functionality while shedding attribution and copyleft obligations. "It works," Mike Nolan, one of the two people behind Malus, who researches the political economy of open source software and currently works for the United Nations, told 404 Media. "The Stripe charge will provide you the thing, and it was important for us to do that, because we felt that if it was just satire, it would end up like every other piece of research I've done on open source, which ends up being largely dismissed by open source tech workers who felt that they were too special and too unique and too intelligent to ever be the ones on the bad side of the layoffs or the economics of the situation." 404 Media reports: Malus's legal strategy for bypassing copyright is based on a historically pivotal moment for software and copyright law dating back to 1982. Back then, IBM dominated home computing, and competitors like Columbia Data Products wanted to sell products that were compatible with software that IBM customers were already using. Reverse engineering IBM's computer would have infringed on the company's copyright, so Columbia Data Products came up with what we now know as a "clean room" design.

It tasked one team with examining IBM's BIOS and creating specifications for what a clone of that system would require. A different "clean" team, one that was never exposed to IBM's code, then created BIOS that met those specifications from scratch. The result was a system that was compatible with IBM's ecosystem but didn't violate its copyright because it did not copy IBM's technical process and counted as original work.

This clean room method, which has been validated by case law and dramatized in the first season of Halt and Catch Fire, made computing more open and competitive than it would have been otherwise. But it has taken on new meaning in the age of generative AI. It is now easier than ever to ask AI tools to produce software that is identical in function to existing open source projects, and that, some would argue, are built from scratch and are therefore original work that can bypass existing copyright licenses. Others would say that software produced by large language models is inherently derivative, because like any LLM output, it is trained on the collective output of humans scraped from the internet, including specific open source projects.

Malus (pronounced malice), uses AI to do the same thing. "Finally, liberation from open source license obligations," Malus's site says. "Our proprietary AI robots independently recreate any open source project from scratch. The result? Legally distinct code with corporate-friendly licensing. No attribution. No copyleft. No problems." Copyleft is a type of copyright license that ensures reproductions or applications of the software keep it free to share and modify.

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Реестр отечественного программного обеспечения Минцифры пополнился мобильной операционной системой (ОС) AQOS разработчика «Аквариус», следует из протокола заседания Экспертного совета по программному обеспечению на сайте министерства. Компания подала заявку в конце января 2026 года и получила одобрение 17 апреля.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/russia/18272429#cut0 ) )

Google announced two new tensor processing units (TPUs) for the "agentic era," with separate processors dedicated to training and inference. "With the rise of AI agents, we determined the community would benefit from chips individually specialized to the needs of training and serving," Amin Vahdat, a Google senior vice president and chief technologist for AI and infrastructure, said in a blog post. Both chips will become available later this year. CNBC reports: After years of producing chips that can both train artificial intelligence models and handle inference work, Google is separating those tasks into distinct processors, its latest effort to take on Nvidia in AI hardware. [...] None of the tech giants are displacing Nvidia, and Google isn't even comparing the performance of its new chips with those from the AI chip leader. Google did say the training chip enables 2.8 times the performance of the seventh-generation Ironwood TPU, announced in November, for the same price, while performance is 80% better for the inference processor.

Nvidia said its upcoming Groq 3 LPU hardware will draw on large quantities of static random-access memory, or SRAM, which is used by Cerebras, an AI chipmaker that filed to go public earlier this month. Google's new inference chip, dubbed TPU 8i, also relies on SRAM. Each chip contains 384 megabytes of SRAM, triple the amount in Ironwood. The architecture is designed "to deliver the massive throughput and low latency needed to concurrently run millions of agents cost-effectively," Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google parent Alphabet, wrote in a blog post.

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