Foliate Makes Finding Free eBooks Easier, Adds Support for Comics

Finding free ebooks to read in Foliate, a GTK ebook reader for Linux desktops, just got a whole lot easier. The new Foliate 2.2.0 release comes with several enhancements, one of which is better eBook discovery via OPDS. OPDS is the “feed” protocol used by free ebook services like the Gutenberg Project, Standard Ebooks, and Feedbooks to share free works with the wider wold. Having the works available from this repos accessible within the app is a nice touch. The new “Catalog” feature (to give it its proper name) is accessible as a tab on the new Library view. You can manually add additional OPDS feeds (e.g., the Internet Archive) as well as edit or remove the ones which are there by default. Also: Tartube – Watch And Download Videos from YouTube and more

Router Freedom challenged by new European rules

From 21 June a new set of rules will guide the implementation of Router Freedom in Europe. The internalisation of the rules by the 27 EU member states will face challenges with negative consequences for Router Freedom. The FSFE contributed to several improvements of the guidelines and will monitor compliance with them. The COVID-19 pandemic shows how dependent people are on the Internet for their work and personal life. In times of lockdown, when people need to stay home and work remotely, the whole internet traffic, encryption, business and work interaction are transferred through personal routers. Since 2013, the FSFE has been advocating for Router Freedom in Europe with outstanding results in Germany and effects beyond its borders. Now, a new set of rules, for which the FSFE contributed to improve, will guide the implementation of Router Freedom in Europe. We summarise the positive outcomes as well as the challenges ahead.

Features Merged Into Linux 5.8 Tree

• Linux 5.8 Flipping On ERASE/Discard/TRIM For All MMC Hosts

  The MMC changes for new kernel cycles don't tend to be particularly noteworthy but it's a different story with the new Linux 5.8 kernel cycle. With Linux 5.8, erase/discard/trim support is being enabled now for all (e)MMC/SD hosts. The Linux kernel has long supported this discard/trim support for MMC/SD but until now it's been opt-in by the host drivers. But thanks to all of the host driver work and MMC core improvements over the past number of kernel cycles, the developers are content enough with the overall state of the support that they are no longer making it opt-in but will make it supported on all hosts. Of course, the card in question still needs to support these commands for it to be supported, but at least the host capability checks are now removed from MMC core.

• Linux's Pstore Picking Up A Block Device Backend For Storing Oops & Panic Messages

  Linux's pstore "persistent storage" code is seeing a number of improvements for the Linux 5.8 kernel. Pstore is the Linux interface to persistent storage for archiving a limited amount of data across reboots, such as for archiving kernel oops or panic messages so they can be easily analyzed following a reboot from such a fatal problem.

• AMD SPI Driver Sent In For Linux 5.8

  Adding to the multiple new AMD drivers coming with Linux 5.8 is their new SPI controller driver. The AMD SPI controller driver (spi-amd) was mailed out in April and for supporting the SPI controller within newer AMD SoCs. This 300+ lines of code driver was previously outlined in this earlier article.

• AMD Energy Driver Sent In For Linux 5.8 Along With Driver For Industrial/Military SBCs

  The hardware monitoring "HWMON" subsystem updates were sent in today for the newly-opened Linux 5.8 merge window. On the hardware monitoring front this cycle the updates include: - The new AMD Energy driver for exposing the energy sensors on Zen/Zen2 CPUs. From my own testing so far this new driver is working out quite well albeit long overdue.