The Free Software Foundation's deputy director Sean O'Brien published a statement criticizing Raspberry Pi's bootloader firmware, which since 2024 has included checks that can prevent the board from recognizing or booting with replacement RAM soldered on by users, even when the new memory is electrically compatible and of equal capacity. O'Brien argues this goes beyond the organization's existing objection to Raspberry Pi's nonfree firmware, calling the RAM-detection mechanism a form of Digital Restrictions Management (DRM).
A report describes an upcoming Apple feature called HomeView, aimed at improving how users control smart home devices. The coverage frames it as a response to long-standing complaints about cluttered apps and intrusive ads in existing smart home software.
Samsung has confirmed that several Galaxy Tab lines are receiving their last major OS upgrades. The Tab S9, S9+, S9 Ultra, S9 FE and S9 FE+ will get One UI 9 (Android 17) as their final update, with security patches continuing to around 2028. The Tab S8 series and the budget Tab A9 line have already received their final OS upgrade, One UI 8 (Android 16), with security support ending in 2027 for the S8 models and about a year from now for the A9 series.
Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University's Kenneth C. Griffin School of Computer Science have launched the Preceptorship for AI-accelerated Software Engineering (PRAISE) program. It lets early-career Microsoft software engineers take CMU online courses in software engineering and AI while receiving structured mentorship from senior engineers at the company. One participant, Jace Watson, takes the courses remotely from Seattle while working full-time at Microsoft.
HyperX has released the Cloud Alpha Air, a wired over-ear open-back gaming headset priced at $149.99. It uses 40mm drivers with a 20-20,000 Hz frequency range and a proprietary 'HyperX Bass Tube' designed to preserve bass response despite the open-back design, and it ships with a detachable boom microphone. Tom's Hardware measured the headset at roughly 10 ounces without the mic and cable, making it one of HyperX's lightest models.
Milan-based holding company Bending Spoons, which went public on Nasdaq in July, disclosed a new $330 million investment from Berkshire Hathaway this week, bringing Berkshire's total stake to more than $900 million. Shares jumped 41% on the news before paring gains, leaving Bending Spoons with a market cap near $30 billion. The company also confirmed layoffs at recently acquired Airtable, following job cuts at other portfolio firms like Evernote, Vimeo and WeTransfer.
A CNET writer detailed switching from Microsoft 365 to LibreOffice, a free and open-source office suite developed by The Document Foundation since 2010. The suite includes six applications—Writer, Calc, Impress, Draw, Base and Math—that mirror Microsoft's Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Visio and Access, and it runs on Windows, MacOS and Linux.
The IEEE Computer Society's Columbia Section Chapter (Region 3) held a technical session examining how AI in software development is moving beyond simple code-completion tools. Speakers discussed the emergence of agentic AI systems capable of more autonomous roles in enterprise software engineering workflows.
A writer describes running Quake's original CPU-based software renderer at 800x600 locked to 60fps on a Dell OptiPlex 380, far beyond resolutions possible in the 1990s. The piece contrasts this approach with 3D-card-accelerated versions such as GLQuake and 3dfx modes for Blood and Tomb Raider, noting software rendering draws every pixel via the CPU with no graphics card involved.
Sony has told UK customers it will not deliver the Android 17 upgrade it had promised for the Xperia 10 VI when the midrange phone launched over two years ago. The company cited a technical assessment that found the device's storage configuration couldn't support an adequate Android 17 experience. Sony says it will still provide security updates through June 2028 and that other Xperia models' update plans are unaffected.
Bank of America brought on roughly 1,000 contract workers to remediate software vulnerabilities uncovered by Anthropic's Mythos system. The hiring suggests the AI tool identified a substantial volume of issues requiring manual remediation work.
A programmer who worked on animation systems for the cancelled open-world title 'This is Vegas' at Surreal Software (Midway Seattle) around 2010 describes a memory management technique called a stack allocator, also known as a bump allocator. The method pre-allocates a fixed block of memory and uses a simple integer pointer to track allocation and deallocation, replacing costly dynamic memory calls that had become a profiling bottleneck in per-frame animation blending.
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