GoKawiil
Tech News
Penguin Mail is a new open-source email client built in Rust for Linux, supporting Gmail, Outlook, iCloud, Fastmail and generic IMAP/POP3/SMTP accounts with automatic server detection. It unifies multiple accounts into one synced inbox with tray notifications, and bundles calendar, contacts, OpenPGP/S-MIME encryption via GnuPG, and support for provider-side filtering rules like Gmail filters and Sieve.
PhotoCraft is a new open-source image editor built entirely in Rust as a clean-room reimplementation of Adobe Photoshop's core functionality. It supports layers, masks, adjustment layers, layer styles, type, vector tools, brushes and native PSD file compatibility, running offline as a native desktop application. The project is part of ArtCraft, a broader suite of creative tools and community for artists.
A technical essay contends that modern operating systems, particularly POSIX-based free and open-source ones, miss optimization opportunities because compilers, build systems and package managers don't share dependency and resource information with each other or the wider system. The author compares older C build tooling, where compiler and build system are separate, with modern languages like Rust, Go and Zig, where tight integration already yields benefits. They use a hypothetical tightly-integrated C build system to illustrate what additional advantages could be unlocked.
The tapo library for Rust and Python has been updated to version 0.11.1, enabling it to communicate with Tapo devices using TP-Link's TPAP protocol. This change follows a firmware update that disabled third-party access unless a specific setting is turned off, which has caused issues for users relying on unofficial clients. The update also introduces new device support and features requested by users, reflecting ongoing efforts to maintain compatibility amidst security and firmware changes.
Form Energy has developed a new iron-based battery technology capable of storing energy for up to 100 hours, utilizing a reversible rusting process. The company has begun commercial production at its West Virginia facility, with a 150 MWh system scheduled for deployment in Minnesota in 2027, and has secured multiple deals including a large project with Xcel Energy to power a Google data center between 2028 and 2031. These batteries aim to provide multiday energy storage to support renewable power integration and reduce reliance on fossil fuels.
In programming, integer operations require explicit checks for overflow or failure, with languages like C and Rust providing tools to handle such cases. Conversely, floating-point calculations based on IEEE-754 standards produce NaN or infinity upon errors, which propagate silently without crashing the program. This fundamental difference influences how developers approach error handling in each domain.
A developer released Minigraf, an open-source, single-file embedded graph database written in Rust, published to crates.io at version 2.0.2. It supports Datalog queries with recursive rules, bi-temporal time travel across transaction and valid time, window functions, and prepared statements, and is designed to run natively, in WASM, or on mobile and IoT devices.
The mold high-speed linker project has released version 3.0.0, its first version built entirely in Rust after being ported from C++. Version 2.42.1 remains the final C++ release, and the new version is designed as a drop-in replacement, accepting the same command-line options and producing equivalent output while matching prior linking performance.
At the Python Language Summit, software engineer David Hewitt presented a proposed timeline and success criteria for incorporating Rust into CPython, following up on discussions from last year's PyCon. The effort, led by core developers Kirill Podoprigora and Emma Smith, now involves roughly 60 contributors including some Python core developers and Rust project members, and includes a draft PEP. The plan calls for Python distributors to test optional Rust support starting with Python 3.16, due October 2027.
A new set of patches to rustc and cargo, called 'Headstart' and enabled via -Zearly-metadata and -Zheadstart flags, lets dependent crates begin compiling against a dependency's early interface metadata (.early-rmeta) before that dependency's function bodies are fully type-checked. For cargo check, dependents can run to completion on this early metadata; for cargo build, dependents do their analysis early then wait for full metadata before code generation, releasing their job slot while waiting.
Rust's #[derive(Debug)], #[derive(Clone)] and similar macros automatically attach an #[inline] attribute to the generated methods, as shown by expanding the macros or noted in the language reference. This behavior isn't formally guaranteed by the language specification but is consistently observed in current compiler output.
Developers have released wpd, an open-source WebP image decoder written in Rust with handwritten assembly for performance-critical routines. The project aims to avoid the memory-safety bugs common in C-based decoders like libwebp, while matching or exceeding its decoding speed. Source code is available on GitHub under halidecx/wpd.