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Microsoft rolls out GPT-5 across its Copilot suite - here's where you'll find it

Adam Gray/Bloomberg via Getty Images ZDNET's key takeaways Microsoft is rolling out GPT-5 to all its AI offerings, Thursday. The Copilot chatbot will provide GPT-5, even to free users. GPT-5 will also be available to coding and enterprise tools. OpenAI released its much-anticipated upgrade to the engine that powers ChatGPT and many other AI implementations, including Microsoft's AI offerings, on Thursday. Concurrent with the GPT-5 release, Microsoft announced that it is upgrading its consu

Window Activation

You click a link in your chat app, your browser with a hundred tabs comes to the front and opens that page. How hard can it be? Well, you probably know by now that Wayland, unlike X, doesn’t let one application force its idiot wishes on everyone else. In order for an application to bring its window to the front, it needs to make use of the XDG Activation protocol. A KWrite window that failed to activate and instead is weeping bitterly for attention in the task bar In essence, an application ca

I don't read your email threads

I Don't Read Your Email Threads 08 Aug, 2025 Email threads have got to be one of the worst possible forms of communication. You've been here before. A perfectly respectable morning is passing by. You're working through your items at a chipper pace maybe humming a song you heard on Spotify that morning. Then, the dreaded email thread comes through. Innocently, you click into the top email. The only text is "[Your Name] see below." I hate this and I bet you do too. Suddenly, you're transporte

iOS 26: Friends Can't Decide What to Eat? Here's How to Create a Poll in Messages

Apple released the second public beta of iOS 26 on Aug. 7, and the beta brings a new Liquid Glass design, call screening and more features to the iPhones of developers and beta testers. It also introduced a host of new features to Messages. One of the more useful features is the ability to create a poll in the messaging app. Group chats can be chaotic, and sometimes it feels like only a few people are talking. Creating a poll in a group chat is a nice way to let everyone voice their opinion on

The Song of the Summer Is Dead

Devon Powers says there is one significant data point no one has considered in the debate around 2025’s Song of the Summer, or rather, why there doesn’t really seem to be one this year: Donald Trump. As media has become less centralized—music streamers replaced radio stations, TikTok killed the music video, and so on—how people consume music, and who they listen to, has become even more fragmented. But today, Trump represents a reawakened avatar of cultural togetherness. He may be the closest t

WIRED Tested Dozens of Blenders. These Are Our 9 Favorites (2025)

FAQs and Tips How We Test Blenders AccordionItemContainerButton LargeChevron Blenders are asked to do a lot; hot and cold, fibrous and crunchy, butters and milks. So we tested all of that. We of course tested each blender's ability to make a uniform smoothie, filtering the results through a sieve to see how much fine pulp remained. In the most recent round of testing, I made peanut butter, first attempting a two-ingredient (salt and nut) version with no oil—then tested the slightly easier versi

Life-like robots for sale to the public as China opens new store

Life-like robots for sale to the public as China opens new store 3 hours ago Share Save Adam Hancock Business reporter Share Save Reuters A life-size humanoid replica of Albert Einstein at the store A new robot shop has opened in Beijing selling everything from mechanical butlers to human-like replicas of Albert Einstein. More than 100 types of products will be on sale at Robot Mall, which launched in the Chinese capital on Friday. The store is one of the first in the country to sell humanoid

Virtual Linux Devices on ARM64

500 virtual Linux devices on ARM 64 Underjord is an artisanal consultancy doing consulting in Elixir, Nerves with an accidental speciality in marketing and outreach. If you like the writing you should really try the pro version. This is the first part of an experimental journey as I explore how many instances of my favorite IoT framework I can run on the 192 core Ampere One. Background I work on the Nerves project which is an IoT framework providing best-practice underpinnings and support so

Writing a storage engine for Postgres: An in-memory table access method (2023)

With Postgres 12, released in 2019, it became possible to swap out Postgres's storage engine. This is a feature MySQL has supported for a long time. There are at least 8 different built-in engines you can pick from. MyRocks, MySQL on RocksDB, is another popular third-party distribution. I assume there will be a renaissance of Postgres storage engines. To date, the efforts are nascent. OrioleDB and Citus Columnar are two promising third-party table access methods being actively developed. Why

Linear sent me down a local-first rabbit hole

I started using Linear a couple of months ago and using it made me go down a technical rabbit hole that changed how I think about web applications. For the uninitiated, Linear is a project management tool that feels impossibly fast. Click an issue, it opens instantly. Update a status and watch in a second browser, it updates almost as fast as the source. No loading states, no page refreshes - just instant, interactions. After building traditional web apps for years, this felt wrong. Where’s th

Age Verification Is Sweeping Gaming. Is It Ready for the Age of AI Fakes?

In July, Siyan, a UK-based Discord user, logged on one morning and found himself unable to access some of his text chats marked NSFW. The channel, a popup informed him, was now age-restricted. The United Kingdom had enacted its far reaching child safety laws, which includes an age requirement system to verify users are over 18. Discord’s updates required users to verify their age, either by government ID or a face scan. Siyan (who requested to only be referred to by his screen name for privacy

Black Hat 2025: Why your AI tools are becoming the next insider threat

Want smarter insights in your inbox? Sign up for our weekly newsletters to get only what matters to enterprise AI, data, and security leaders. Subscribe Now Cloud intrusions increased by 136% in the past six months. North Korean operatives infiltrated 320 companies using AI-generated identities. Scattered Spider now deploys ransomware in under 24 hours. However, at Black Hat 2025, the security industry demonstrated that it finally has an answer that works: agentic AI, delivering measurable resu

Microsoft rolls out GPT-5 across its Copilot suite - here's what we know

Matthias Balk/picture alliance via Getty Images ZDNET's key takeaways Microsoft is rolling out GPT-5 to all its AI offerings, Thursday. The Copilot chatbot will provide GPT-5, even to free users. GPT-5 will also be available to coding and enterprise tools. OpenAI released its much-anticipated upgrade to the engine that powers ChatGPT and many other AI implementations, including Microsoft's AI offerings, Thursday. Concurrent with the GPT-5 release, Microsoft announced that it is upgrading i

This free ChatGPT feature flew under the radar - but it's a game changer

Sabrina Ortiz/ZDNET ZDNET's key takeaways ChatGPT's Advanced Voice Mode is now available for free users. With the feature, users can access a conversational voice assistant. Advanced voice, now known as ChatGPT voice, replaces Standard Voice Mode. While OpenAI's new large language models (LLMs) in ChatGPT, such as GPT-5, which just launched today, typically steal the spotlight, some of the best gems are found in the less talked-about features, like Advanced Voice Mode. Also: GPT-5 is final

New executive order puts all grants under political control

On Thursday, the Trump administration issued an executive order asserting political control over grant funding, including all federally supported research. The order requires that any announcement of funding opportunities be reviewed by the head of the agency or someone they designate, which means a political appointee will have the ultimate say over what areas of science the US funds. Individual grants will also require clearance from a political appointee and "must, where applicable, demonstra

The Paranoid Style in American Politics (1964)

It had been around a long time before the Radical Right discovered it—and its targets have ranged from “the international bankers” to Masons, Jesuits, and munitions makers. American politics has often been an arena for angry minds. In recent years we have seen angry minds at work mainly among extreme right-wingers, who have now demonstrated in the Goldwater movement how much political leverage can be got out of the animosities and passions of a small minority. But behind this I believe there is

Writing a storage engine for Postgres: an in-memory Table Access Method

With Postgres 12, released in 2019, it became possible to swap out Postgres's storage engine. This is a feature MySQL has supported for a long time. There are at least 8 different built-in engines you can pick from. MyRocks, MySQL on RocksDB, is another popular third-party distribution. I assume there will be a renaissance of Postgres storage engines. To date, the efforts are nascent. OrioleDB and Citus Columnar are two promising third-party table access methods being actively developed. Why

What are semiconductors and why is Trump threatening 100% tariffs?

What are semiconductors and why is Trump threatening 100% tariffs? 11 hours ago Share Save Liv McMahon & Shiona McCallum Technology reporters Share Save Getty Images The manufacture of the tiny tech that powers billions of devices is under a microscope. US President Donald Trump has said he plans to introduce 100% tariffs on semiconductor imports. The tiny chips power a range of different devices and are integral to modern technology and the global economy. While some semiconductor producers

Three new ways to customize your macOS Tahoe 26

9to5Mac is brought to you by CleanMyMac: Tidy up your Mac and iPhone today! Try 7 days free and use our code 9TO5MAC15 for 15% off. Also check out CleanMyPhone for your iPhone! macOS Tahoe 26 gives your Mac a significant redesign, headlined by the new Liquid Glass design language. The update also brings new ways to personalize your Mac, with new icon tinting features, menu bar customization, and more. Here’s how these new customization options work. Icon tinting Apple added icon tinting to t

Topics: bar icon mac menu new

The Tesla Cybertruck May Have Found Its True Calling: Target Practice

Table of Contents The Tesla Cybertruck May Have Found Its True Calling: Target Practice Few vehicles inspire stronger opinions than the Tesla Cybertruck. Drivers and passersby either love or hate the shiny, sharp-angled trucks, many of which have been vandalized and even shot with paintball guns as a reaction against Tesla CEO and former Trump administration staffer Elon Musk. So this one's for you, Cybertruck haters: The Air Force recently had 33 vehicles, including two Cybertrucks, delivered

New executive order puts all grants under political control

On Thursday, the Trump administration issued an executive order asserting political control over grant funding, including all federally supported research. The order requires that any announcement of funding opportunities be reviewed by the head of the agency or someone they designate, which means a political appointee will have the ultimate say over what areas of science the US funds. Individual grants will also require clearance from a political appointee and "must, where applicable, demonstra

Lotus is the latest carmaker to upgrade CarPlay

British sports car maker Lotus is upgrading the CarPlay experience for iPhone users this week with a free software update. Starting this week, Spatial Audio in CarPlay is available in the electric Eletre and Emeya models from Lotus. The update enhances Apple Music playback with immersive Dolby Atmos sound, powered by KEF’s premium in-car audio systems. Pushing the boundaries of the in-car listening experience, ELETRE and EMEYA are equipped with ground-breaking technologies from legendary Briti

Fake WhatsApp developer libraries hide destructive data-wiping code

Two malicious NPM packages posing as WhatsApp development tools have been discovered deploying destructive data-wiping code that recursively deletes files on a developer's computers. Two malicious NPM packages currently available in the registry target WhatsApp developers with destructive data-wiping code. The packages, discovered by researchers at Socket, masquerade as WhatsApp socket libraries and were downloaded over 1,100 times since their publication last month. Despite Socket having fil

Doximity buys Pathway Medical for $63 million to help doctors get AI-powered answers

Doximity at the New York Stock Exchange for its initial public offering on June 24, 2021. Doximity is diving deeper into artificial intelligence, announcing on Thursday the acquisition of startup Pathway Medical for $63 million. Pathway has built an AI-powered clinical reference tool that doctors can use to ask questions about guidelines, drugs and trials. Pathway's answers are synthesized from medical literature, and Doximity said the Montreal-based startup has one of the largest structured d

Heretic and Hexen have received a surprise remaster from Nightdive Studios

Nightdive Studios and id Software have announced a surprise remaster of fantasy shooters Heretic and Hexen. The games are now available for modern consoles in a new release, dubbed Heretic + Hexen, that includes support for co-op, cross-platform multiplayer and community-published mods. Heretic + Hexen combines Heretic: Shadow of the Serpent Riders, Hexen: Beyond Heretic and Hexen: Deathkings of the Dark Citadel into a single bundle. On top of making the updates necessary to get the games runni

CISA orders fed agencies to patch new Exchange flaw by Monday

CISA has issued an emergency directive ordering all Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) agencies to mitigate a critical Microsoft Exchange hybrid vulnerability tracked as CVE-2025-53786 by Monday morning at 9:00 AM ET. Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) agencies are non-military agencies within the US executive branch, including the Department of Homeland Security, Department of the Treasury, Department of Energy, and Department of Health and Human Services. The flaw tracked as CVE-

Beware of promptware: How researchers broke into Google Home via Gemini

Maria Diaz/ZDNET ZDNET's key takeaways Researchers demonstrated a way to hack Google Home devices via Gemini. Google put additional safeguards in place for Gemini in response. Keeping your devices up-to-date on security patches is the best protection. The idea that artificial intelligence (AI) could be used to maliciously control your home and life is one of the main reasons why many are reluctant to adopt the new technology -- it's downright scary. Almost as scary as having your smart devi

OpenAI's new open-source model is basically Phi-5

OpenAI just released its first ever open-source large language models, called gpt-oss-120b and gpt-oss-20b. You can talk to them here. Are they good models? Well, that depends on what you’re looking for. They’re great at some benchmarks, of course (OpenAI would never have released them otherwise) but weirdly bad at others, like SimpleQA. Some people really like them. Others on Twitter really don’t. From what I can tell, they’re technically competent but lack a lot of out-of-domain knowledge: fo

Researchers used Gemini to break into Google Home - here's how

Maria Diaz/ZDNET ZDNET's key takeaways Researchers demonstrated a way to hack Google Home devices via Gemini. Google put additional safeguards in place for Gemini in response. Keeping your devices up-to-date on security patches is the best protection. The idea that artificial intelligence (AI) could be used to maliciously control your home and life is one of the main reasons why many are reluctant to adopt the new technology -- it's downright scary. Almost as scary as having your smart devi

Zero-day flaws in authentication, identity, authorization in HashiCorp Vault

Introduction: when the trust model can’t be trusted Secrets vaults are the backbone of digital infrastructure. They store the credentials, tokens, and certificates that govern access to systems, services, APIs, and data. They’re not just a part of the trust model, they are the trust model. In other words, if your vault is compromised, your infrastructure is already lost. Driven by the understanding that vaults are high-value targets for attackers, our research team at Cyata set out to conduct