OSNews
Open source project contains hidden instruction for “AI” agents: delete my code
It's no secret there's a war going on inside the open source community, with people adopting "AI" on one side, and those that want nothing to do with it on the other. While the former are, by nature, using destructive tactics like mass website scraping, license washi
OSNews
Gnutella: a protocol outliving the world that created it
Now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time.
Gnutella is a file sharing protocol that many have forgotten and it has the story of a decentralized technology adopted by millions of casual users who did not care to learn what a peer-to-peer system was. Users showed up because the protocol solved real problems at scal
https://www.osnews.com/story/145066/gnutella-a-protocol-outliving-the-world-that-created-it/
OSNews
Get your passwords out of BitWarden while you still can
I was a long-time Bitwarden user, until a year or so ago when I started migrating my passwords first to Firefox/LibreWolf, and recently from there to a KeePass database I can transfer and use with whatever password manager application is compatible with KeePass' file format. It seems I was accidentally on time, as it'
https://www.osnews.com/story/145029/get-your-passwords-out-of-bitwarden-while-you-still-can/
OSNews
We're running a big fundraiser for @osnews, in honour of my 21 year tenure and 20000th post! Since my wife can barely work due to health issues (caused by her work, ugh), my family has to rely on my income much more heavily. And that means OSNews donations.
We've also got a bunch of fun incentives!
More details:
Donate:
OSNews
Microsoft isn’t removing Copilot from Windows 11, it’s just renaming it
A few weeks ago, Microsoft made some concrete promises about fixing and improving Windows, and among them was removing useless "AI" integrations. Applications like Notepad, Snipping Tool, and others would see their "AI" features removed. Well, it turns out Microsoft employs a very fringe defin
OSNews
Adobe secretly modifies your hosts file for the stupidest reason
If you're using Windows or macOS and have Adobe Creative Cloud installed, you may want to take a peek at your hosts file. It turns out Adobe adds a bunch of entries into the hosts file, for a very stupid reason.
I found that in my hosts file the other day too, and I investigated to find why they're doing
OSNews
FreeBSD 14.4 released
While FreeBSD 15.x may be getting all the attention, the FreeBSD 14.x branch continues to be updated for the more conservative users among us. FreeBSD 14.4 has been released today, and brings with it updated versions of OpenSSH, OpenZFS, and Bhyve virtual machines can now share files with their host over 9pfs - among other things, of course.
OSNews
ArcaOS 5.1.2 released
While IBM's OS/2 technically did die, its development was picked up again much later, first through eComStation, and later, after money issues at its parent company Mensys, through ArcaOS. eComStation development stalled because of the money issues and has been dead for years; ArcaOS picked up where it left off and has been making steady progress since its first release in 2017. Regardless, the d
OSNews
Microsoft really doesn’t want you to use the name “Microslop”
Microsoft is pushing "AI" hard in Windows, Office, and in their other products, and it's earned them a cute new nickname: Microslop. It turns out the company really doesn't like it when you use this nickname, however, and its official Copilot Discord server - yes, there is an official one - has gone into a co
https://www.osnews.com/story/144518/microsoft-really-doesnt-want-you-to-use-the-name-microslop/
OSNews
The Windows 95 user interface: a case study in usability engineering
If this isn't catnip to the average OSNews reader, I don't know what is.
Windows 95 is a comprehensive upgrade to the Windows 3.1 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 products. Many changes have been made in almost every area of Windows, with the user interface being no exception. This paper discusses
OSNews
“Never buy a .online domain”
I’ve been a .com purist for over two decades of building. Once, I broke that rule and bought a .online TLD for a small project. This is the story of how it went up in flames.
↫ Tony S.
An absolute horror story about Google's dominance over the web, in places nobody really talks about. Scary.
https://www.osnews.com/story/144487/never-buy-a-online-domain/
OSNews
The age-verification trap: verifying user’s ages undermines everyone’s data protection
Social media is going the way of alcohol, gambling, and other social sins: Societies are deciding it’s no longer kid stuff. Lawmakers point to compulsive use, exposure to harmful content, and mounting concerns about adolescent mental health. So, many propose to s
OSNews
GTK-NoCSD: an LD_PRELOAD library to disable CSDs
While Libadwaita applications running in a GNOME desktop environment look great and nicely consistent, they look utterly out of place and jarring when run in Xfce, Pantheon, KDE, and others. The biggest reason for this is GNOME's insistence on using client-side decorations, which feel at home inside a GNOME environment, but out of place in envi
https://www.osnews.com/story/144473/gtk-nocsd-an-ld_preload-library-to-disable-csds/
OSNews
SvarDOS: an open-source DOS distribution
SvarDOS is an open-source project that is meant to integrate the best out of the currently available DOS tools, drivers and games. DOS development has been abandoned by commercial players a long time ago, mostly during early nineties. Nowadays it survives solely through the efforts of hobbyists and retro-enthusiasts, but this is a highly sparse and
https://www.osnews.com/story/144420/svardos-an-open-source-dos-distribution/
OSNews
Why do I not use “AI” at OSNews?
In my fundraiser pitch published last Monday, one of the things I highlighted as a reason to contribute to OSNews and ensure its continued operation stated that "we do not use any 'AI'; not during research, not during writing, not for images, nothing." In the comments to that article, someone asked:
Why do I care if you use AI?
↫ A comment posted on OSNews
A few d
https://www.osnews.com/story/144405/why-do-i-not-use-ai-at-osnews/
OSNews
80386 barrel shifter
I’m currently building an 80386-compatible core in SystemVerilog, driven by the original Intel microcode extracted from real 386 silicon. Real mode is now operational in simulation, with more than 10,000 single-instruction test cases passing successfully, and work on protected-mode features is in progress. In the course of this work, corners of the 386 microcode and silicon have been examined in
OSNews
The official unplanned emergency OSNews fundraiser!
It's time for an OSNews fundrasier! This time, it's unplanned due to a financial emergency after our car unexpectedly had to be scrapped (you can find more details below). If you want to support one of the few independent technology news websites left, this is your chance. OSNews is entirely supported by you, our readers, so go to our
https://www.osnews.com/story/144352/the-official-unplanned-emergency-osnews-fundraiser/
OSNews
OpenBSD-current now runs as guest under Apple Hypervisor
Excellent news for OpenBSD users who are tied to macOS: you can now run OpenBSD using Apple's Hypervisor.
Following a recent series of commits by Helg Bredow and Stefan Fritsch, OpenBSD/arm64 now works as a guest operating system under the Apple Hypervisor.
↫ Peter N. M. Hansteen at the OpenBSD Journal
If you have an
https://www.osnews.com/story/144202/openbsd-current-now-runs-as-guest-under-apple-hypervisor/
OSNews
Modern HTML features on text-based web browsers
They're easily overlooked between all the Chrome and Safari violence, but there are still text-based web browsers, and people still use them. How do they handle the latest HTML features?
While CSS is the star of the show when it comes to new features, HTML ain’t stale either. If we put the long-awaited styleable selects and Apple’s take
https://www.osnews.com/story/144178/modern-html-features-on-text-based-web-browsers/
OSNews
Windows Explorer likely to get Copilot “AI” sidebar
We all knew this was going to happen, so let's just get it over with.
Microsoft is testing a new feature that integrates Copilot into the File Explorer, but it’s not going to be another ‘Ask Copilot’ button in the right-click menu. This time, Copilot will live inside File Explorer, likely in a sidebar or Details/Preview-pane-li
https://www.osnews.com/story/144163/windows-explorer-likely-to-get-copilot-ai-sidebar/
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