Cloudflare data suggests desktop Linux usage in North America has climbed to 6.4%, up from 4.1% a year earlier, with one post-holiday workday briefly spiking to 22%. ZDNet reports: [B]elieve it or not, on Monday, July 6, when people were back after the July 4 holiday, Linux usage jumped to a high of 22%. The users of these systems are not AI agents or bots, but real people. I set Cloudflare to count humans rather than bots. If you include people and bots, Linux has a 9.7% market share. That proportion is similar to StatCounter's score. By Cloudflare's count, bots alone come to 19%.

These numbers tell us that workers are leading the way to the Linux desktop. [...] However, past performance doesn't explain present trends. So, why are we now seeing such a bump in Linux desktop growth? Experts believe this trend is largely AI developers and Linux users running AI Agents. For example, as David Linthicum, former managing director and chief cloud strategy officer at Deloitte Consulting and AI and cloud influencer, recently observed, while "Windows 11 can technically run local AI workloads, but as you begin using multiple tools, managing different projects, and installing various dependencies, the friction starts to build," it's a different story for Linux users.

Linthicum continued: "Linux delivered what I can only describe as a true 'AI desktop' experience. Setup was straightforward, mainstream AI instructions matched what you'd actually see in your environment, and GPU-accelerated apps simply worked -- consistently. I spent far less time troubleshooting and far more time actually executing on projects." As for agents, Linux Foundation CEO Jim Zemlin summed up their role succinctly: "Linux is the OS of choice for AI agents." Desktop Linux is also gaining momentum as frustration with Windows 11 and the end of Windows 10 support push users to alternatives, particularly on older PCs that can't officially upgrade. At the same time, Linux has become much easier to use, install software on, and game with, lowering many of the traditional barriers to switching.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ian Clarke (aka ancient Slashdot reader Sanity), designer of the peer-to-peer communication platform Freenet, is back with an update on the project's progress following the launch of its P2P network in March. He writes: Earlier this year, Slashdot covered the launch of the completely redesigned Freenet. I recently gave a talk about what we've been building since then. Unlike traditional web applications, apps on Freenet have no central server or database; instead application state is distributed across the network. These now include decentralized group chat, publishing, search, and fully decentralized Git hosting. The talk also gets into some of Freenet's internals, including how we use machine learning for network routing.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

jovo2021 has added a photo to the pool:

Gojō, Kyoto City, Japan

hiroki.sato has added a photo to the pool:

hiroki.sato has added a photo to the pool:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

date stamped on slide, August 1965

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

“Widely regarded as the most complicated board game ever made, The Campaign for North Africa tries to simulate WW2’s North African theater in as granular fashion as possible…” 1500 hours to finish the game — that’s 1h20m every day for 3 years.

The prime minister tells the Guardian that last year’s diplomatic rift with ally New Zealand could be on voters’ minds as they head to the polls

As voters in the Cook Islands prepare to head to the polls in a high-stakes general election, they will have much to reflect on. Over recent years, politics in this small island nation has been defined by fierce debates about deep-sea mining, diplomatic rifts with ally New Zealand and a major reshaping of the country’s foreign partnerships.

In an exclusive interview with the Guardian, days before Wednesday’s poll, Cook Islands prime minister Mark Brown defended his four-year term and the decisions he made that have seen this South Pacific nation of 17,000 people pushed into the international limelight, turning it into a battleground for influence between Beijing and western powers.

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BOSTON (ANP/RTR) - Een federale rechter heeft de Amerikaanse postdienst (USPS) verboden een deel van een presidentieel decreet van Donald Trump uit te voeren. Het decreet is bedoeld om de regels voor stemmen per post aan te scherpen in aanloop naar de verkiezingen van november.

De uitspraak bouwt voort op een eerdere beslissing van de rechter in juni. Daarmee blokkeerde de rechter Trumps plannen voor strengere regels voor stemmen per post in 23 staten, die grotendeels door Democraten worden bestuurd.

Verschillende organisaties voor kiesrecht hadden de rechter gevraagd ook een andere voorgestelde regel voor USPS te blokkeren. Volgens die regel moeten staten eerst stemlijsten samenstellen en nieuwe stemprocedures invoeren voordat stembiljetten per post verstuurd kunnen worden. Als staten daar niet aan voldoen, zou USPS de stembiljetten niet mogen bezorgen.

OOSTRUM (ANP) - Door de grote brand in het Noord-Limburgse natuurgebied Boschhuizerbergen zijn er van de ongeveer 4000 jeneverbesstruiken die daar voorkwamen nog maar een kleine honderd over. Dat meldt stichting Het Limburgs Landschap.

In het natuurgebied brak op maandag 3 augustus een brand uit die dagen heeft doorgewoed. Een week later meldde de brandweer "zeker nog de hele week" bezig te zijn met nablussen. De brand legde ongeveer 100 hectare natuur in de as.

Het Limburgs Landschap zet zich "met man en macht in" om de resterende jeneverbesstruiken te beschermen. Tientallen mensen zetten zich in door stoplijnen nat te houden, toezicht te houden op het gebied en door de nasmeulende brandhaarden te bestrijden.

Michiel Uitdehaag, de burgemeester van Venray, zei eerder in een gesprek met premier Rob Jetten in Venray dat het heel lang gaat duren voordat de jeneverbesstruiken in het gebied weer hersteld zijn. "Dat gaan wij in onze generatie niet meer meemaken."

BIRMINGHAM (ANP) - Nadine Visser heeft de week voor de EK atletiek in Birmingham nog behoorlijk in de stress gezeten. De winnares van het goud op de 100 meter horden kreeg last van haar achillespees en twijfelde of ze wel zou kunnen meedoen.

"Het was even heel pittig. Een week geleden had ik er veel stress van. Een medische check enkele dagen voor het toernooi bracht opluchting, want ik kreeg groen licht", vertelde de 31-jarige Visser na de finale. "Ook al had ik pijn, ik wist dat ik ermee kon lopen. En dat heb ik gelukkig kunnen laten zien. Alhoewel ik nu wel veel pijn heb. De ereronde was geen pretje, eerlijk gezegd."