News

An anonymous reader shared this report from Phoronix: Due to the growing number of GNOME Shell extensions looking to appear on extensions.gnome.org that were generated using AI, it's now prohibited. The new rule in their guidelines note that AI-generated code will be explicitly rejected: "Extensions must not be AI-generated While it is not prohibited to use AI as a learning aid or a development tool (i.e. code completions), extension developers should be able to justify and explain the code they submit, within reason. Submissions with large amounts of unnecessary code, inconsistent code style, imaginary API usage, comments serving as LLM prompts, or other indications of AI-generated output will be rejected." In a blog post, GNOME developer Javad Rahmatzadeh explains that "Some devs are using AI without understanding the code..."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The R programming language "is sometimes frowned upon by 'traditional' software engineers," says the CEO of software quality services vendor Tiobe, "due to its unconventional syntax and limited scalability for large production systems." But he says it "continues to thrive at universities and in research-driven industries, and "for domain experts, it remains a powerful and elegant tool." Yet it's now gaining more popularity as statistics and large-scale data visualization become important (a trend he also sees reflected in the rise of Wolfram/Mathematica). That's according to December's edition of his TIOBE Index, which attempts to rank the popularity of programming languages based on search-engine results for courses, third-party vendors, and skilled engineers. InfoWorld explains: In the December 2025 index, published December 7, R ranks 10th with a 1.96% rating. R has cracked the Tiobe index's top 10 before, such as in April 2020 and July 2020, but not in recent years. The rival Pypl Popularity of Programming Language Index, meanwhile, has R ranked fifth this month with a 5.84% share. "Programming language R is known for fitting statisticians and data scientists like a glove," said Paul Jansen, CEO of software quality services vendor Tiobe, in a bulletin accompanying the December index... Although data science rival Python has eclipsed R in terms of general adoption, Jansen said R has carved out a solid and enduring niche, excelling at rapid experimentation, statistical modeling, and exploratory data analysis. "We have seen many Tiobe index top 10 entrants rising and falling," Jansen wrote. "It will be interesting to see whether R can maintain its current position." "Python remains ahead at 23.64%," notes TechRepublic, "while the familiar chase group behind it holds steady for the moment. The real movement comes deeper in the list, where SQL edges upward, R rises to the top 10, and Delphi/Object Pascal slips away... SQLclimbs from tenth to eighth at 2.10%, adding a small +0.11% that's enough to move it upward in a tightly packed section of the table. Perl holds ninth at 1.97%, strengthened by a +1.33% gain that extends its late-year resurgence." It's interesting to see how TIOBE's ranking compare with PYPL's (which ranks languages based solely on how often language tutorials are searched on Google): TIOBE PYPL Python Python C C/C++ C++ Objective-C Java Java C# R JavaScript JavaScript Visual Basic Swift SQL C# Perl PHP R Rust Despite their different methodologies, both lists put Python at #1, Java at #5, and JavaScript at #7.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This week System76 launched the first stable release of its Rust-based COSMIC desktop environment. Announced in 2021, it's designed for all GNU/Linux distributions — and it shipping with Pop!_OS 24.04 LTS (based on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS). An anonymous reader shared this report from 9to5Linux: Previous Pop!_OS releases used a version of the COSMIC desktop that was based on the GNOME desktop environment. However, System76 wanted to create a new desktop environment from scratch while keeping the same familiar interface and user experience built for efficiency and fun. This means that some GNOME apps have been replaced by COSMIC apps, including COSMIC Files instead of Nautilus (Files), COSMIC Terminal instead of GNOME Terminal, COSMIC Text Editor instead of GNOME Text Editor, and COSMIC Media Player instead of Totem (Video Player). Also, the Pop!_Shop graphical package manager used in previous Pop!_OS releases has now been replaced by a new app called COSMIC Store. "If you're ambitious enough, or maybe just crazy enough, there eventually comes a time when you realize you've reached the limits of current potential, and must create something completely new if you're to go further..." explains System76 founder/CEO Carl Richell: For twenty years we have shipped Linux computers. For seven years we've built the Pop!_OS Linux distribution. Three years ago it became clear we had reached the limit of our current potential and had to create something new. Today, we break through that limit with the release of Pop!_OS 24.04 LTS with the COSMIC Desktop Environment. Today is special not only in that it's the culmination of over three years of work, but even more so in that System76 has built a complete desktop environment for the open source community... I hope you love what we've built for you. Now go out there and create. Push the limits, make incredible things, and have fun doing it!

Read more of this story at Slashdot.