While System76 has been hard at work on a redesigned Thelio desktop chassis design , this hasn't slowed down their software work. Today they shipped COSMIC Epoch 1.0.8 as the newest work on their open-source, Rust-based desktop environment used by their in-house Pop!_OS Linux distribution as well as found in other Linux distributions too.

COSMIC Epoch 1.0.8 has the latest bug fixes and usability enhancements to this interesting Rust and Wayland powered desktop. COSMIC Epoch 1.0.8 addresses possible VLC freezing with COSMIC Applets, the WiFi authentication dialog will now focus on the password input for better usability, the COSMIC background has parallelized its gradient generation for better performance, the COSMIC compositor has updated its Smithay version, and more.

The COSMIC Files file manager has also seen a number of refinements, the COSMIC Player media player will now unmute automatically when changing volume, adjusting the default Qt theme for the COSMIC session, and also various changes to COSMIC Terminal and other contained apps.

Downloads and more details on today's COSMIC Epoch 1.0.8 release via the System76 blog .