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29 May 2026

OSnews

Genode OS Framework 26.05 released

The work on the May release has been dominated by topics on account of the just published Sculpt OS version 26.04. Besides featuring profound driver improvements across Wifi, ACPI, I2C HID, SOF audio, and graphics, it turns the most innovative aspects of Sculpt OS into building blocks for the easy reuse in other incarnations of Genode-based systems. In the same vein, the Goa SDK has been updated to match the latest Sculpt OS version while accumulating plenty of detail improvements. Further highlights of the release are the new touch-awareness of the window manager making Sculpt OS usable on tablets, the addition of Linux user-space networking based on libslirp, the update of Qt to version 6.8.3, and a largely revised LTE modem stack. ↫ Genode OS Framework 26.05 release notes In addition, the migration from GitHub to Codeberg has been completed as well, which is a big step forward for the project.

29 May 2026 1:37pm GMT

NVIDIA retires its classic Control Panel application for Windows

In the release notes for the latest NVIDIA driver version for Windows, the "AI" company who happens to spare a few GPUs for regular users every now and then has announced that the curtain has fallen for the classic NVIDIA Control Panel. After 20 years of dedicated service, the classic NVIDIA Control Panel is officially retiring for Game Ready and Studio Drivers. For NVIDIA RTX PRO users, the NVIDIA Control Panel will continue to be supported until we have migrated professional features to the NVIDIA app. Existing installs of the NVIDIA Control Panel will remain on users' systems, unless they perform a clean installation, and users who still need the NVIDIA Control Panel can continue to download it from the Microsoft Store, but we won't be adding features, fixes, or other changes. ↫ NVIDIA GeForce driver release notes According to NVIDIA, every setting has migrated from the Control Panel to the NVIDIA application, meaning it's no longer necessary to keep maintaining it. Of course, the NVIDIA application also happens to have ads, a login mechanism, and is probably just an inefficient web application, so not everybody may be excited about the loss of the NVIDIA Control Panel.

29 May 2026 1:28pm GMT

Ars Technica

Rocket Report: A dark day for Blue Origin; Pentagon eyes new launch site

A new crew launched to China's Tiangong space station, and one of the astronauts will stay for a year.

29 May 2026 1:03pm GMT

Here's why the failure of Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket is so catastrophic

"I hope that it makes it far enough away from the pad that it does not cause pad damage."

29 May 2026 12:43pm GMT

Slashdot

FBI Arrests CIA Official With $40 Million In Gold Bars In His Home

A senior CIA official, David Rush, was arrested after investigators found more than $40 million in gold bars and about $2 million in cash at his Virginia home. According to the New York Times, "The only charge lodged against David Rush is that he inflated his academic credentials and obtained military leave pay worth tens of thousands of dollars." From the report: The court papers describe Mr. Rush as a "former senior executive service-level employee at a United States government agency." People familiar with the investigation say he until very recently held a senior position at the C.I.A. In a joint statement, the C.I.A. and F.B.I. said the arrest occurred on May 19, after the agency alerted the bureau. "After a C.I.A. internal investigation identified potential violations of the law, C.I.A. Director John Ratcliffe referred the information to the F.B.I. for a law enforcement investigation," the statement said. From last November to March, the court papers say, Mr. Rush asked for, and received, "a significant quantity of foreign currency and tens of millions of dollars in gold bars for work-related expenses." When the C.I.A. conducted a review of where the gold and currency were stashed, the agency was "unable to locate the gold bars or significant amounts of the foreign currency," according to court papers. On May 18, F.B.I. agents searched Mr. Rush's home and found "approximately 303 gold bars, each of which weighed approximately one kilogram," according to an affidavit. Based on the price of gold, the affidavit said, the estimated value of the gold exceeded $40 million. Investigators also seized nearly three dozen luxury watches, many of them Rolexes. The court papers do not indicate why Mr. Rush appears to have kept so much gold, and $2 million in U.S. currency, in his home, or what work project would have required him to amass such wealth.

Ars Technica

These researchers would be in Africa fighting ebola—but Trump cut their funding

US Infectious diseases centers launched during COVID have lost their funding under Trump.

29 May 2026 10:30am GMT

Slashdot

NASA Details Its Plan to Build a Lunar Base At the Moon's South Pole

NASA has outlined a three-phase plan to build a lunar base at the moon's south pole. The first phase, from 2026 to 2029, will focus on robotic missions, landers, rovers, reactors, satellites, and Blue Origin's Blue Moon Mark 1 Endurance test. Later phases will add habitats, power systems, communications, cargo logistics, and rotating crews. Wired reports: According to a recent press conference, phase one will be particularly active: at least 25 missions and 21 surface landings. Without detailing specific dates, the agency said that over the next three years it will send rovers, including manned models for future mobility, drones, surface reactors, new-generation satellites, and payloads to prepare the ground. One of the first key missions will be the test of the Blue Moon Mark 1 Endurance module in fall 2026. Its purpose is to evaluate conditions for a controlled descent and validate navigation and positioning technology. It will not carry astronauts. If the mission is successful, Blue Origin plans a manned version around 2028, possibly with Blue Moon Mark 2. Moon Base II and III missions are also part of the program's 2026 startup. One will send rovers and payloads to evaluate more complex rover operations; the other will carry scientific instruments to study the behavior of materials and systems under extreme lunar conditions. Phase two, starting in 2029, marks the beginning of semipermanent infrastructure assembly and first occupancy operations. NASA plans to install advanced energy systems, including surface reactors, initial habitat elements, and more robust communication networks. Up to 60 tons of cargo will be delivered in 24 missions during this period. Phase three is for scale-up. The infrastructure in place will be strengthened and expanded to form durable centers with constant turnover of personnel. NASA envisions a lunar south pole with habitable modules, reliable power systems, logistics networks for cargo and crew transportation, and the shipment of about 38 tons of cargo annually for maintenance and expansion. "Every mission, crewed and uncrewed, will be a learning opportunity as we return to the lunar surface, build the infrastructure to stay, and master the skills required to live and operate in one of the most demanding and dangerous environments imaginable," said administrator Jared Isaacman in a NASA statement. "We will go for the science, for all we stand to gain from an economic and technological perspective, for the innovations that will make life better here on Earth, and to prepare for where we will inevitably go next."

MIT Researchers Develop a Low-Cost Technique To Get Lithium Out of Rocks

An anonymous reader quotes a report from MIT News: Currently, lithium hard rock extraction involves baking the rock at over 1,000 Celsius and chemically leaching it to extract lithium. The rest of the rock is discarded. Now, a team of researchers from MIT and elsewhere has developed a low-temperature process for extracting battery-grade lithium from the most common type of lithium-bearing mineral. The process uses a liquid reagent to dissolve the rock into the useful forms of its constituent parts: not just battery-ready lithium salts, but also smelter-grade alumina and cement-ready silica. After the minerals are extracted, the solvent and reagent can be recovered and used again so waste levels approach zero. The researchers estimate the closed-loop process is half the cost of traditional lithium hard rock extraction and could make it cost-competitive with extracting lithium from brine water. "We believe this approach is the lowest-energy, lowest-cost way of getting lithium not only out of hard rock, but period," says Yet-Ming Chiang, MIT's Kyocera Professor of Materials Science and Engineering. "That's what's motivating us to scale this. It will enable the energy transition through batteries that use lithium. This was one of the goals of The Climate Project at MIT -- to work on projects that, within a short number of years, could transition from the lab to commercialization and impact." A paper describing the process has been published in the journal Science.

28 May 2026

OSnews

Why Gentoo?

When you think of Gentoo, you tend to think of it being a difficult distribution, where you compile everything yourself. There's much more to Gentoo than that. Yes, some of it comes from building from source: the flexibility. But a lot of it comes from the wider Gentoo philosophy, the philosophy that brought us all together. The idea that Gentoo is the distribution we're making for ourselves and people who enjoy Gentoo. So if I were to make a few arguments for Gentoo, I'd focus on that. And this is what I'd like to do here. ↫ Michał Górny When I think of Gentoo, I think of an immovable, sturdy object that has always existed, and will always exist, because it doesn't really care about being trendy, user-friendly, or flashy. I generally group it together with Slackware as one of the very pure Linux distributions, that focuses more on doing things the correct way, and if they can't be done the correct way, it won't be done at all. Neither Gentoo nor Slackware are really my jam, but the amount of respect and admiration I have for both projects is immense. Górny highlights a few other characteristics of Gentoo that appeal to me as well, such as a ban on "AI"-generated code, its strong independence and lack of corporate backing, and its flexibility stemming from the fact it's source-first. I feel like even when the entire world has crumbled to dust, Gentoo will still be there, ready and available to anyone who has the enthusiasm to jump in. We must protect Gentoo at all costs.

28 May 2026 11:09pm GMT