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As of this writing, 2,346 non-merge changesets have been pulled into the mainline repository for the 7.3 kernel release. That, clearly, is a mere down payment on the flood that is to come. Even so, those early pulls brought in some noteworthy changes, including (but not limited to) a significant reworking of how group scheduling works on multiprocessor systems.

Security updates have been issued by AlmaLinux (bind9.18, glib2, gstreamer1-plugins-bad-free, gstreamer1-plugins-good, kernel-rt, libcupsfilters, mysql8.4, mysql:8.4, pcp, perl-Date-Manip, php8.4, php:7.4, php:8.2, php:8.3, python3, and yggdrasil), Debian (designate, firefox-esr, and swift), Gentoo (acl, attr, Emacs, libssh2, and quickjs-ng), Oracle (.NET 10.0, .NET 9.0, attr, bind9.18, curl, glib2, gstreamer1-plugins-bad-free, gstreamer1-plugins-good, kernel, libXfont2, mysql8.4, nghttp2, nodejs:22, nodejs:24, pam, pcp, perl-Date-Manip, php8.4, python3, sg3_utils, and yggdrasil), Slackware (mozilla-firefox and mozilla-thunderbird), SUSE (open-iscsi, podman, python311, and python313), and Ubuntu (bind9, capnproto, curl, libheif, libpng, libpng1.6, libssh, nginx, and tiff).

starkOS is an independently-developed GNU/Linux distribution designed for experienced Linux users. It uses a ports system and the stark package manager to install and update software from source code. The project provides a lightweight live image with Sway Wayland compositor and some basic software on it. The live system does not include an installer; however, starkOS can be installed to a hard disk using one of the rootfs filesystems (with a choice of runit, s6 or SysV init software) provided separately. The project's goal is to develop a Linux distribution that is simple, lightweight, up-to-date and extensible.

Inside this week's LWN.net Weekly Edition:

• Front: Debian AI GR; Python pathlib; bootstrappable builds; Fedora and AF_ALG; Arm 128-bit PTEs; BPF CI; 7.2 statistics.
• Briefs: Brief news items from throughout the community.
• Announcements: Newsletters, conferences, security updates, patches, and more.

Garuda Linux is a rolling distribution based on the Arch Linux operating system. Unlike Arch Linux, Garuda Linux comes with a graphical installer (Calamares) for easy installation, and other advanced graphical tools for managing your system. Garuda is a performance-oriented distro with many performance enhancing tweaks. Some of the many tweaks include using zram, a performance CPU governor, along with custom memory management software. Garuda Linux has striven to provide system stability by including the Timeshift backup utility.

Plop Linux is an independently-developed Linux distribution for desktops and servers, available for the i486, x86_64 and armv6l architectures. It is designed for advanced Linux users. The distribution does not include a package manager; installing new software is done by compiling it from source code. The desktop edition of the Plop Linux ships with the Xfce and MATE desktops as well as the Fluxbox window manager. The distribution's server edition comes with basic server software installed, but additional programs, including web servers, databases and programming languages can be easily added from the project's repositories.

MODICIA O.S. is a Linux multimedia distribution designed primarily for musicians, graphic designers and video makers. It is based on Debian's "stable" branch, but uses the Cinnamon desktop and a recent Linux kernel. MODICIA O.S. comes with a set of carefully-selected, open-source multimedia software and tools, such as Audacity (audio editor), Brasero (disc-burning utility), Cheese (webcam application), Curlew (multimedia converter), GIMP (graphics editor), HandBrake (video transcoder), Kdenlive (video editor), MediaInfo (tool that provides technical data about media files), mpv (media player), Peek (animated GIF recorder), RawTherapee (photo processor), XnView (image viewer), and many others. The distribution also integrates the OnlyOffice software suite for general office tasks.

Go 1.27, the most recent version of the Go programming language, has been released with a number of new tools, the addition of support for the ML-DSA post-quantum algorithm, new JSON-processing packages, language updates, and more.

Greg Kroah-Hartman has announced the release of the 7.1.9, 6.18.45, 6.12.104, 6.6.152, 6.1.183, 5.15.216, and 5.10.265 stable kernels. Each contains important fixes throughout the tree; users are advised to upgrade.

The Amnesic Incognito Live System (Tails) is a Debian-based live DVD/USB with the goal of providing complete Internet anonymity for the user. The product ships with several Internet applications, including web browser, IRC client, mail client and instant messenger, all pre-configured with security in mind and with all traffic anonymised. To achieve this, Incognito uses the Tor network to make Internet traffic very hard to trace.

The Debian Project is voting on the usage of large language models (LLMs) to make contributions to the project. The first proposal, sent in late July by Matthias Geiger, would expressly forbid any contributions to Debian that are created by or with the assistance of LLMs. That kicked off a firestorm of discussion and a flood of alternate proposals. Debian developers are now voting on eight proposals in total that range from banning LLM-assisted contributions to explicitly approving them, as well as the standard "none of the above" option that would leave Debian with no agreed policy.

Version:7.1.9 (stable) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-7.1.9.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-7.1.9.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-7.1.9

Version:6.18.45 (longterm) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-6.18.45.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-6.18.45.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-6.18.45

Version:6.12.104 (longterm) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-6.12.104.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-6.12.104.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-6.12.104

Version:6.6.152 (longterm) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-6.6.152.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-6.6.152.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-6.6.152

Version 0.11 of the Tuba fediverse client has been released. Notable changes in this release include support for Mastodon collections and quotes, ability to create custom thumbnails for attachments, a new emoji picker, a build for Android, as well as many other enhancements.

Version:6.1.183 (longterm) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-6.1.183.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-6.1.183.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-6.1.183

Version:5.15.216 (longterm) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-5.15.216.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-5.15.216.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-5.15.216

Version:5.10.265 (longterm) Released:2026-08-19 Source:linux-5.10.265.tar.xz PGP Signature:linux-5.10.265.tar.sign Patch:full (incremental) ChangeLog:ChangeLog-5.10.265

At the outset of his PyCon US 2026 talk, Trey Hunner said that his goal was for attendees to stop representing filesystem paths as strings and to use pathlib instead. That's kind of a tall order, at least for longtime Python users, since string-based paths have been pervasive—and mostly work. It is that "mostly" part that makes Hunner want to see things change, of course, so he set out to describe a lesser-known corner of the language and to try to change some minds.