While Linux 7.0 is the next kernel version solely over Linus Torvalds' numbering preference , there is a notable symbolic change that was sent in overnight for this new kernel merge window: formally concluding the "Rust experiment" with upstream kernel developers now in acceptance that Rust for the Linux kernel is here to stay.

The patch was talked about back in December that the Rust experiment is over and it's here to stay . There are already uses for Rust in production environments, some Linux distributions shipping with Rust kernel

Following last week's release of GNU Coreutils 9.10 , released today is GNU Binutils 2.46 for these commonly used GNU binary utilities on Linux systems and elsewhere.

The big theme of GNU Binutils 2.46 is a lot of work around SFrame version 3 support for that lightweight stack trace format designed for fast, low-overhead debugging. There is also AMD Zen 6 support in the GNU Assembler and various other RISC-V and AArch64 instructions now supported by that assembler too.

Following Linus Torvalds releasing Linux 6.19 stable , Linus Torvalds is now out with his customary release announcement. Notably he officially confirmed that the next kernel version is Linux 7.0 as the successor to Linux 6.19.

Linus Torvalds wrote in the Linux 6.19 release announcement :

"I have more than three dozen pull requests for when the merge window opens tomorrow - thank you to all the early maintainers. And as people have mostly figured out, I'm getting to the point where

As anticipated due to the extra week for the cycle given end of year holidays, Linus Torvalds today released the Linux 6.19 stable kernel as the first major release of 2026. There is a lot in store with this early 2026 kernel release.

Linux 6.19 as usual is especially heavy on Intel and AMD changes including AMD GCN 1.0 / GCN 1.1 dGPUs now defaulting to the AMDGPU driver rather than Radeon legacy driver for better performance, RADV compatibility out

After discovering this morning that Intel archived/discontinued its On Demand "SDSi" GitHub project around that controversial feature, it was a slippery slope in noticing Intel recently archived around two dozen other open-source projects they previously maintained.

Since late 2025 there have been numerous GitHub repositories that Intel officially maintained and now are marked as archived with Intel engineers no longer maintaining them. The latest projects now-archived by Intel since December are noted below. Notably, abandoning of these projects all came after last year'

D7VK is a fork of the DXVK project that is an important part of Valve's Steam Play (Proton) for Direct3D 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 support atop Vulkan. With D7VK the original goal was a Direct3D 7 implementation on Vulkan . D7VK 1.1 brought experimental Direct3D 6 support and now with today's release of D7VK 1.3 is support for Direct3D 5.

For those wanting to enjoy classic Windows

With Linux 6.19 due for release later today it then opens up the next kernel merge window. It could be Linux 6.20 but more than likely the next kernel version will be called Linux 7.0 with Linus Torvalds' past tradition of bumping the major version number after X.19. Whatever it ends up being called, here is a look at various "-next" changes that have been queuing up ahead of the merge window.

Among the changes and new features expected to be

Back in 2021 on Phoronix was first to report on Intel preparing Linux patches for a "Software Defined Silicon" feature for activating extra licensed hardware features. That Software Defined Silicon support continued moving forward and was then announced as Intel On Demand with a focus on users being able to pay to activate additional accelerators found on select SKUs but not enabled by default.

This pay-to-use model for accelerator IPs already found in the Xeon processors was widely panned. The Intel On Demand allowed for paying to use

Building off Friday's release of Wine 11.2 is now Wine-Staging 11.2 as this experimental/testing version of Wine with hundreds of extra patches that have yet to be introduced in upstream proper for this open-source software enabling Windows games and applications on Linux. Notable in this bi-weekly update are more patches for continuing to improve the Adobe Photoshop installer support on Linux.

Recently there were patches posted for getting the Adobe Photoshop 2025 installer working on Linux . The installer