Firefox starts adding AI, Wayland gets window & session restore: Linux & Open Source News

Summary

In this week's episode of Linux & Open Source News, we delve into Firefox's latest experimental AI features in its Nightly builds, aimed at providing AI-generated summaries for links, albeit imperfectly. Furthermore, Wayland resolves a key frustration by introducing a protocol for window and session restoration, and Framework announces the pre-orders for their new Framework Laptop 12. Additionally, Microsoft's AI tool identifies vulnerabilities in GRUB, Nvidia opens up more of their GPU code to open source, and updates in gaming technology and partnerships are on the horizon, including advancements for AMD Vulkan drivers and Valve's upcoming VR headset.

Highlights

• Firefox is testing a feature that uses AI to create summaries of web links which could be helpful but lacks personal engagement 🤖.
• Wayland's update allows users to restore windows to their original size and position, saving valuable time ⏱️.
• Framework is launching a new customizable laptop model, perfect for DIY enthusiasts and Linux users 🛠️.
• Revolutionary AI tools by Microsoft found critical security vulnerabilities in popular bootloaders 🛡️.
• Nvidia continues to embrace open-source principles by publicizing more of its software components 📜.
• New developments in AMD drivers make Linux a top choice for gamers, especially on older devices 🎮.
• Valve's new VR headset might not just be hype, integrating seamlessly with Steam OS for immersive gameplay 🚀.
• Tuxedo Computers is highlighted as a top choice for Linux-friendly hardware purchases 🖥️.

Key Takeaways

• Firefox's new AI tool can summarize articles from links but has its drawbacks 🚀.
• Wayland's new protocol for session restore is a game changer for multi-window users 🎯.
• The Framework Laptop 12 is now open for pre-orders and is ideal for Linux aficionados 💻.
• Microsoft's AI tool unveils vulnerabilities in open-source projects, highlighting security concerns 🔓.
• Nvidia's commitment to open source grows by open-sourcing more GPU-related code 📂.
• Linux shines for gaming on older hardware with new updates to the AMD Vulkan drivers 🕹️.
• Valve's rumored VR headset could revolutionize standalone VR gaming experiences 🎮.

Overview

This week in Linux & Open Source News, we explore several exciting developments. Firefox's incorporation of AI for summarizing web links in its latest Nightly builds is a step forward, though not without criticisms over its speed and accuracy. Wayland enthusiasts have reason to cheer as a new protocol is introduced to tackle the age-old problem of window management, allowing applications to retain their layouts even after a reboot. Framework's announcement of the Framework Laptop 12 pre-orders is also catching eyes, with its DIY approach appealing to Linux users.

Security in the open-source world gets a spotlight with Microsoft using its AI tools to uncover serious vulnerabilities in GRUB and other bootloaders. While beneficial for improving security, it raises concerns about such tools potentially being used for malicious purposes too. Nvidia, on the other hand, pushes the frontier of open-source by releasing more of its GPU-related code, promising to enhance software development and gaming experiences on Linux.

In gaming, Wine and AMD make strides in optimizing Linux for a broader range of hardware, enhancing its reputation as a robust platform for gamers. Valve's upcoming VR headset leaks suggest it might be a game-changer, combining standalone capabilities with Steam OS. Meanwhile, Tuxedo Computers continues to stand out as a go-to provider for Linux pre-installed systems, blending hardware compatibility with community contributions. Overall, it's been a week of promising advancements in Linux and open source!

Chapters

• 00:00 - 00:30: Introduction The chapter introduces the latest updates in the world of Linux and open-source technology. It mentions Firefox integrating AI into its nightly builds, though the implementation seems imperfect. Moreover, Wayland is introducing a new protocol to restore windows to their original positions and sizes, addressing a common critique among its users. Lastly, Framework has started taking pre-orders for the Framework Laptop 12, though it's not specified further in the provided text.
• 00:30 - 01:00: Proton Mail sponsorship This chapter discusses the sponsorship of a Linux-related video by Proton Mail. It highlights Proton Mail as a provider of secure, end-to-end encrypted email services. Additionally, Proton Mail offers a range of services including calendar management, email, contacts, online storage, password management, and a VPN, all integrated into a single platform.
• 01:00 - 03:00: Firefox AI Web Link Preview Feature The chapter discusses the features and benefits of Proton Mail, a secure email service designed to prioritize privacy. It highlights that even Proton employees cannot access user accounts, ensuring high security. Additionally, Proton Mail offers a free base account and various paid plans for additional storage and features. The narrator shares a personal endorsement, stating they use Proton Mail for personal emails, calendar, and contacts, and express satisfaction with the service after more than a year of usage.
• 03:00 - 06:00: Wayland Protocol for Window and Session Restore The chapter discusses the Wayland protocol and its features related to window and session restoration in computing. It highlights the introduction of a new experimental feature in Firefox 139's nightly builds, aimed at enhancing user privacy and experience through AI capabilities. Specifically, the feature allows users to generate AI summaries of linked articles without needing to click and open them, thus preserving the browsing flow and protecting privacy.
• 06:00 - 07:30: Framework Laptop 12 The chapter discusses the concept of using AI to summarize web content, specifically through browser tools like Firefox. It highlights the potential downside of such technology, as it can lead to misunderstandings and may not support original content creators financially, potentially degrading the quality of web content. Additionally, it speculates about a future where AI might dominate content creation.
• 07:30 - 10:00: AI in Security: Microsoft Tool The chapter discusses the use of AI in security, specifically focusing on a Microsoft tool. It critiques the effectiveness and efficiency of this AI tool, indicating that it generates summaries directly on the device, which can be slow depending on the computer's specifications. Additionally, the chapter points out that the summaries produced by the tool are often inaccurate, as noted by OMG Ubuntu and related sources.

Firefox starts adding AI, Wayland gets window & session restore: Linux & Open Source News Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 hey everyone and welcome back to the Linux and open source news show This week we've got Firefox finally bringing their AI stuff inside of the latest nightly builds and it doesn't look like it's excellent We've got Wayland adding a protocol that lets you restore windows at their right position and the right sizes fixing one of the major annoyances of Wayand for people who like to interact with a lot of Windows And we've got Framework opening up the pre-orders for their Framework Laptop 12 but not in
• 00:30 - 01:00 the US plus a lot of other Linux related news And also this segue to our sponsor This video is sponsored by Proton Mail You know about them probably You know that they offer a fully endto-end encrypted and zero access encrypted email solution But they also have a complete platform of services to do your calendar your email your contacts your online storage your password managers and even your VPN all with one single
• 01:00 - 01:30 account that cannot be accessed even by Proton employees They've got all the features that you'd expect to protect your privacy but also to help you actually do your job And while the base account is free they of course have paid plans if you need more storage and more features Proton Mail is what I use for all my personal email calendar and contacts And I've been using them for more than a year now I'm very very happy with the service And if you want to take
• 01:30 - 02:00 advantage of all of this privacy and all of these features the link is in the description So people interested in AI will be happy to know that Firefox 139's nightly builds now include the experimental web link preview feature that Modzilla had been talking about when they said they wanted more AI It's basically a way to generate an AI summary of an article that's behind a link that you're hovering over So you don't have to click that link open it in
• 02:00 - 02:30 a new tab and read it yourself You can instead just ask Firefox to summarize what the content behind that link says thus getting a heavily misunderstood version of that content and not supporting the person who wrote that article in the end making them not able to keep writing that content and making the web a worse place in the process Now of course if we postulate that every single article will be written by AI in 5 years then you're just using AI to
• 02:30 - 03:00 summarize what another AI bot has written And at that point you're not hurting anyone anymore cuz there's no one left to hurt Now do mongering aside though OMG Ubuntu seems to think that this thing isn't that good It's apparently pretty slow to generate all these summaries because it's all done on device So depending on your computer it can be relatively speedy or very slow And OMG Ubuntu also seem to indicate that the summaries are very often inaccurate something Modzilla actually
• 03:00 - 03:30 warns you about saying that the key points might have mistakes and are devoid of humor nuance or originality The feature can still be enabled if you want to try it out In the about config page you can enable the browser.ml.link preview.enabled property you set it to true and then you can toggle that feature by pressing shift plus alt and hovering over a link Something Firefox will definitely change before the final release to make it easier to activate uh when they decide that this is good enough for everyone Of
• 03:30 - 04:00 course the feature is experimental so you should not expect it to work properly You should not expect it to be super fast or very interesting or accurate And also it's AI so always take what it generates with a big big fat grain of salt I'm not a fan of this AI direction I must say Hopefully they use an ethical model to do this something fully open source trained on an ethically sourced data set with open data not something that they stole off of the internet or bought from another
• 04:00 - 04:30 company But I could not find any details on how they powered it So if you find that let me know in the comments Now this week Whan gained another protocol A big one that should fix one big remaining annoyance The top level tag protocol lets Whan clients so applications set a specific tag for their windows These tags can then be used once the app is restarted to get some persistent information like the position on screen of the application
• 04:30 - 05:00 its size the fact that it's always on top or on a specific workspace or specific compositor rules Basically this protocol allows for a full session restore or application and window properties restore where closed applications can remember their size and position on screen even after a reboot something that has been annoying on Wayland since the beginning of this thing because while it's not a lot of work to resize and move your windows around it's better if you don't have to
• 05:00 - 05:30 do it especially if you start your session with 10 or 15 different apps KWIN already has a first implementation So do motor and GTK And the way it handles things is relatively simple The application just needs to be updated to actually implement the protocol and set the tag and then the compositor itself can associate attributes to that tag and restore these attributes every time an application is reopened So applications will need to do a little bit of work but
• 05:30 - 06:00 it doesn't look like it's a lot and it is a pretty major feature So I would expect every maintained app that actually wants to work on Wayland to implement that little tag and I would expect all compositors to implement a way to store properties related to that tag and so restore windows properly It's a good thing I wasn't that impressed by it initially but my Patreon supporters and YouTube members told me that it is actually a very very major pain point for a lot of people So while personally
• 06:00 - 06:30 it doesn't really affect me cuz I work with two or three windows for developers who have like 20 things opened on three different monitors it is definitely going to be a gamecher Now let's talk about laptops The Framework Laptop 12 is now open for pre-orders for €569 or €79 Canadian So the laptop itself comes in five colorways for the do-it-yourself edition and it comes in black only for pre-made laptops Although assembling that laptop yourself is going to be very
• 06:30 - 07:00 very easy So I would go for that one and pick a nice color Don't have all your electronics black white or gray It's better to have some colorful stuff This laptop is obviously a 12in one because it's the framework laptop 12 And you get either an i3 or an i5 CPU 13th gen of the U series so low power consumption but also not the most powerful CPUs out there It can go up to two terabytes of SSD up to 48 gigs of RAM It got Wi-Fi 6E
• 07:00 - 07:30 and four slots for your usual framework expansion cards plus the headphone jack that you'd expect The display is LCD 1920 x 1200 And the laptop weighs 1.3 kilos which is relatively heavy for a 12-in laptop but Framework generally has very solid build quality with very nice materials so that's to be expected really nice to see Framework expanding their line of devices 12-in might not seem very different from 13-in but in
• 07:30 - 08:00 terms of footprint it does make a difference And generally these laptops work really well with Linux so that's cool Now if you've been following me for a while or if you just started listening to this episode you know that I am very critical of AI tools But this time I have to give them a little bit of praise Security Copilot a Microsoft tool using AI detected 20 vulnerabilities on Grub 2 on Uboot and on Bearbox all open-source bootloadaders And these are
• 08:00 - 08:30 vulnerabilities that no one had found previously In GRUB specifically it is 11 vulnerabilities and these impact all devices that run UEFI secure boot letting attackers bypass protections to run any code on any computer This can be done with local access but it could also be done using boot kits especially in the case of Grub where you could even use the flaws to bypass encryption of a Windows partition for example using Bit Locker Microsoft says that using their
• 08:30 - 09:00 AI tool saved them about one week of analysis time from a human and that the AI provided mitigation recommendations for these vulnerabilities to at least give an avenue to explore to fix the problems These things have been disclosed to the project back in February So if you're up to date on your own updates you likely already have those fixes Now this is both good and bad It's good because open source projects generally don't really have that much time to dedicate to finding
• 09:00 - 09:30 security vulnerabilities and those tools might let them detect them a bit earlier But it's also bad because if they can use those tools malicious hackers can also do so And as soon as a malicious person starts using those AI tools to detect vulnerabilities in your code then as the developer you sort of have to use the same tools on your own code to make sure that at the very least this avenue is blocked and you're not giving a free ride to anyone who wants to hack into
• 09:30 - 10:00 your project or to find a problem specifically It's also really really bad because this is still a Microsoft tool trained on unethically sourced code Basically they pilered GitHub without asking for authorization And so that's still absolutely horrendous But at the very least it served one purpose one time Speaking of open- source code Nvidia opened a lot more stuff this week Specifically code for physics and flow the code that handles GPU acceleration
• 10:00 - 10:30 for those things physics was already open source as the SDK itself but the part that handled GPU simulation so the part you actually want because this is definitely something you want to have accelerated well that part was not open and now it is It seems to use the same BSD3 license that the physics SDK is licensed under And if you don't know physics is a library that lets game developers build realistic hair fur
• 10:30 - 11:00 cloth movement but also ragdolls particles vehicle dynamics basically everything that mimics how gravity or physical forces affects physical elements They also opened the GPU compute shader implementation of Flow Flow being their SDK that handles fluid simulations All the code is on Nvidia's GitHub They apparently actively encourage people to create issues on that code And I know Nvidia sucks for the most part but at the very least
• 11:00 - 11:30 they've been showing some inclination to go more towards open source in recent years They're still not really part of the upstream development process It's not like their driver is straight contributed to Mesa It's still an external thing that is basically incompatible with the Mesa architecture but also the Linux kernel architecture So they're not doing everything well but at least they're opening up some stuff I think that's good Now let's conclude the episode with some pretty interesting gaming news this week First we've got
• 11:30 - 12:00 Wine 10.5 It fixes a few things to run Windows apps on Aahi Linux on Apple's ARM CPUs because it now supports larger page sizes on ARM 64 and it specifically fixes a bug for Aahi Linux to make sure that things run well here On top of that the Moto Engine sees the usual updates The Bluetooth driver for Wine and now supports pairing devices which is useful for Bluetooth Vulcan H.264 decoding is implemented so videos can be played
• 12:00 - 12:30 using the GPU instead of the CPU if they use that codec And you also get 22 bug fixes including for some reason for Microsoft Edge Now we also have one less thing to worry about when it comes to running recent games on older hardware on Linux at least on AMD hardware There's been an update to the AMD Vulcan drivers that lets it emulate rateracing support if it's not physically capable of doing rate tracing So if your GPU does not work with rateracing well you
• 12:30 - 13:00 can masquerade as if you are able to do that So games that absolutely require rateracing like the latest Indiana Jones title can still function on Linux Apparently performance with that emulated rate tracing is good enough for that specific game Although there is no guarantee that other games will perform as well in the future with this emulation So starting with Mesa 25.1 if your AMD GPU does not have any physical
• 13:00 - 13:30 hardware rate tracing capabilities but if you're trying to play a game that requires that the game should still run normally That's for all Polaris GPUs and a few other architectures It's basically the RX 480 530 550 570 and 580 plus the Radian R9285 and the Radeon 520 and 530 That's a pretty cool bit of extra support here for a specific use case but that's going to be more and more generalized as AAA
• 13:30 - 14:00 titles really start to assume everyone has a rateracing capable device It also might mean that the Steam Deck won't be as outdated in the future if it can at least deliver solid enough performance with that emulated rate tracing which isn't guaranteed Now it's still a confirmation that Linux is the absolute best platform for gaming on older hardware because you can't upgrade to the latest Windows version Your Windows drivers will never give you that sort of capability but on Linux it just works
• 14:00 - 14:30 And finally we also had some recent leaks on the new VR headsets from Valve and it looks like it's not that far away It was anticipated for the end of 2025 but it apparently could come sooner Relatively trustworthy sources for leaks on VR related stuff indicated that Valve has received shipments for facial interfaces since the end of last year And those interfaces are only used for VR related hardware And they also can't
• 14:30 - 15:00 be for the Valve Index because this thing is no longer produced and hasn't been for a while Other leaks also are saying that this new Valve VR headset would be a fully standalone thing So you wouldn't need to plug it into a separate computer Although I do hope it still supports that because at some point when the internal hardware gets too old and it cannot play modern games it would be good to at least have access to it as just a headset and not a fully autonomous headset So hopefully they'll
• 15:00 - 15:30 retain the capability to plug it into a computer into just a pass through sort of mode Now second this thing would also let you play games that aren't VR optimized So much like virtually every VR headset I've ever heard of but it's interesting that they mentioned that uh you would basically be able to play any title just like if it was projected on a like movie theater screen in front of you instead of having a VR optimized specific experience Of course that
• 15:30 - 16:00 headset would run Steam OS That's fully expected and it would come with the new controllers that were leaked a while back The price though of this headset might make people a lot less interested in it because it's apparently going to be around $1,200 with a few bundled games but it's still a lot of money And I am very interested in this VR headset The last one I owned and used was the PlayStation VR the original one It was great It
• 16:00 - 16:30 worked really well But first I didn't have a lot of room to play in Second there were like five or six titles that I really enjoyed on this and then I sold it because there was nothing else coming for it So things have progressed since then I haven't played HalfLife Alex and there are a lot of other titles that look interesting in VR I now have a lot more room to play around in as well So I would absolutely purchase this thing especially since it runs Linux which is awesome Awesome Just like our sponsor
• 16:30 - 17:00 Tuxedo Computers Now you probably all know about Tuxedo by now if you've been listening to any of my shows or watching any of my videos They make laptops and desktops that ship with Linux pre-installed They do all the work to make sure that all that hardware runs Linux perfectly They even contribute open-source drivers so everyone can benefit I only use Tuxedo computers these days Everything from my YouTube channel to my podcast to my other YouTube channel in French are all done
• 17:00 - 17:30 on a tuxedo laptop All my gaming needs are served by one of their desktops the Tuxedo Cube And I can only recommend them They're really good They have something for everyone every need every price point There's a lot of customization options So if you need a new computer you want to run Linux on it you want to ensure Linux runs well and you want to give your money to a company that actually contributes to Linux click the link in the description and check out Tuxedo Computers They're really really good So this will conclude
• 17:30 - 18:00 today's episode I hope you enjoyed watching or listening to it As always you know where all the usual YouTube buttons are Do click those like buttons subscribe buttons comments whatever It really really helps the channel grow and it helps me make more of these videos If you want to support the show there are plenty of links in the description to do just that And in the meantime I guess you'll see me in the next video Bye