News Briefs

• The AP reports that Google tracks your location history, even if you turn "Location History" off. On both Android devices and iPhones, Google stores "your location data even if you've used a privacy setting that says it will prevent Google from doing so. Computer-science researchers at Princeton confirmed these findings at the AP's request." This Wired post describes how you actually can disable location tracking.
• The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and The Linux Foundation launched the Academy Software Foundation. The ASF's mission is to "increase the quality and quantity of contributions to the content creation industry's open source software base; to provide a neutral forum to coordinate cross-project efforts; to provide a common build and test infrastructure; and to provide individuals and organizations a clear path to participation in advancing our open source ecosystem". Interested developers can sign up to join the mailing list here.
• The Linux 4.18 kernel is out. See this Phoronix post for a list of the best features of this new kernel.
• Ring-KDE 3.0.0, a GNU Ring.cx client, has been released. GNU Ring is a secure, distributed communication platform based on open industry-standard technologies for audio calls, video conferences, chat, screen-sharing and peer-to-peer file transfer. This new version of Ring-KDE is a full rewrite of the app "to use more modern technologies such as touch support, QtQuick2 and KDE Kirigami adaptive widget framework". When you join GNU Ring, "no servers or centralized accounts are needed. Besides an optional blockchain-based way to reserve your username against takeover, nothing leaves your device", and Ring-KDE "provides a simple wizard to help you create credentials or import your personal information from other devices." For more info, also visit here.
• Intel debuts a totally silent ruler-shaped solid state drive, the Intel SSD DC P4500. This SSD can store 32 terabytes—"equivalent to triple the entire printed collection of the U.S. Library of Congress". In addition, "the no-moving-parts ruler-shaped SSDs can be lined up 32 side-by-side, to hold up to a petabyte in a single server slot. Compared with a traditional SSD, the 'ruler' requires half the airflow to keep cool. And compared with hard disk storage, the new 3D NAND SSD sips one-tenth the power and requires just one-twentieth the space."
• The Mozilla IoT team announced the 0.5 release of the Things Gateway recently, which is "packed full of new features including customisable devices, a more powerful rules engine, an interactive floorplan and an experimental smart assistant you can talk to". If you want to try out this new version of the gateway, you can download it from here and use it on your Raspberry Pi. According to the press release, "A powerful new 'capabilities' system means that devices are no longer restricted to a predefined set of Web Thing Types, but can be assembled from an extensible schema-based system of 'capabilities' through our new schema repository. This means that developers have much more flexibility to create weird and wacky devices, and users have more control over how the device is used."
• Docker is moving to a new release and support cycle for its Community Edition (CE) releases, ServerWatch reports. New Docker CE versions will come out every six months, and each new CE release will be supported for seven months. The next CE Stable release is due out in September. Docker CE Edge releases will move to a faster cycle—from monthly to nightly builds.
• The city of Rome is switching to open-source LibreOffice. The city installed LibreOffice alongside the proprietary alternative on all of its 14,000 PC workstations in April and is gradually making the change. There are 112 staff members called "innovation champions", who are in favour of free and open source, and who are helping with the switch by explaining the reasons for changing to open source and training co-workers (source: Open Source Observatory).
• No Starch Press recently released The Rust Programming Language, the "undisputed go-to book on Rust", authored by two members of the Rust core team—Steve Klabnik and Carol Nichols—and featuring contributions from 42 community members. No Starch comments that "this huge undertaking is sure to make some waves and help build the Rust community". The book is published under an open license and is available for free via the Rust site or for purchase from No Starch in either in print or ebook format.
• A new version of KStars—the free, open-source, cross-platform astronomy software—has been released. Version 2.9.7 includes new features, such as improvements to the polar alignment assistant and support for Ekos Live, as well as stability fixes. See the release notes for all the changes.
• Red Hat's Road to A.I. film has been chosen as an entry in the 19th Annual Real to Reel International Film Festival. According to the Red Hat blog post, this "documentary film looks at the current state of the emerging autonomous vehicle industry, how it is shaping the future of public transportation, why it is a best use case for advancing artificial intelligence and how open source can fill the gap between the present and the future of autonomy." The Road to A.I. is the fourth in Red Hat's Open Source Stories series, and you can view it here.
• Vivaldi Technologies has added a new privacy-focused search engine called Qwant to its Vivaldi web browser. Qwant doesn't store cookies or search history. Softpedia News quotes CEO and co-founder of Vivaldi Jon von Tetzchner: "We believe that the Internet can do better. We do not believe in tracking our users or in data profiling." You need version 1.15 of Vivaldi in order to enable Qwant.
• System76 has moved into its new manufacturing facility in Denver, Colorado. The company will begin making computers in the US, rather than just assembling them. See the System76 blog post for photos of the new digs.