Firefox Now Will Have Enhanced Tracking Protection On by Default, 5.0 Kernel Reaches End of Life, Apple Replacing Bash with zsh as Default Shell, IBM Announces Major Upgrade to Db2 and Oracle's Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel R5 Update 2 Is Now Available
News briefs for June 4, 2019.
Mozilla today announces that the Firefox browser will now have Enhanced Tracking Protection on by default. From Chris Beard's blog post: "These protections work in the background, blocking third-parties from tracking your online activity while increasing the speed of the browser. We're offering privacy protections by default as you navigate the web because the business model of the web is broken, with more and more intrusive personal surveillance becoming the norm. While we hope that people's digital rights and freedoms will ultimately be guaranteed, we're here to help in the interim."
Greg Kroah-Hartman today announced the last maintenance update of kernel 5.0. From his LKML message: "I'm announcing the release of the 5.0.21 kernel. All users of the 5.0 kernel series must upgrade. Note, this is the LAST 5.0.y kernel to be released. It is now end-of-life. Please move to the 5.1.y kernel tree at this point in time."
Apple is replacing bash with zsh as the default shell in macOS Catalina. According to The Verge, "Starting with macOS Catalina, Macs will now use zsh as the default login shell and interactive shell across the operating system. All newly created user accounts in macOS Catalina will use zsh by default. Bash will still be available, but Apple is signaling that developers should start moving to zsh on macOS Mojave or earlier in anticipation of bash eventually going away in macOS."
IBM today announced a major upgrade to its Db2 database. According to the press release, among the many new features of Db2 version 11.5 "is built-in support for data science development. Through a series of newly-available drivers for multiple open source programming languages and frameworks, it will now be easier for developers to analyze and build machine learning models into applications using Db2. The enhancements are designed to help Db2 developers more easily write applications that require less management, are more resilient to outages, and help improve productivity." The press release also notes that "The supported languages include Go, Ruby, Python, PHP, Java, Node.js, Sequelize. In addition there is support for popular frameworks such as Visual Studio Code and Jupyter notebook. The latest drivers and code samples for each are available now at GitHub." Go here for more information on data and AI.
Oracle announces that the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel Release 5 Update 2 is now available. UEK R5 Update 2 is based on the mainline kernel version 4.14.35 and has many new features and bug fixes. Highlights include filesystem and storage fixes, virtualization updates, driver updates and much more.
Jill Franklin is an editorial professional with more than 17 years experience in technical and scientific publishing, both print and digital. As Executive Editor of Linux Journal, she wrangles writers, develops content, manages projects, meets deadlines and makes sentences sparkle. She also was Managing Editor for TUX and Embedded Linux Journal, and the book Linux in the Workplace. Before entering the Linux and open-source realm, she was Managing Editor of several scientific and scholarly journals, including Veterinary Pathology, The Journal of Mammalogy, Toxicologic Pathology and The Journal of Scientific Exploration. In a previous life, she taught English literature and composition, managed a bookstore and tended bar. When she’s not bugging writers about deadlines or editing copy, she throws pots, gardens and reads.
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