Plus Telegram's cryptocurrency is definitely happening. Honest.

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• exFAT in the Linux kernel? Yes! — It’s important to us that the Linux community can make use of exFAT included in the Linux kernel with confidence. To this end, we will be making Microsoft’s technical specification for exFAT publicly available to facilitate development of conformant, interoperable implementations. We also support the eventual inclusion of a Linux kernel with exFAT support in a future revision of the Open Invention Network’s Linux System Definition, where, once accepted, the code will benefit from the defensive patent commitments of OIN’s 3040+ members and licensees.
• The Initial exFAT Driver Queued For Introduction With The Linux 5.4 Kernel — Greg lived up to his talk and today committed the exFAT driver to staging-next. This nearly eleven thousand lines of new code did get the sign-off of Microsoft and with it being in the "-next" branch will be set for inclusion into the Linux 5.4 mainline code-base once Linux 5.3 is released.
• Chris Beard to step down as Mozilla CEO — This is a good place to recruit our next CEO and for me to take a meaningful break and recharge before considering what’s next for me. It may be a cliché — but I’ll embrace it — as I’m also looking forward to spending more time with my family after a particularly intense but gratifying tour of duty.
• Thunderbird 68 released — Thunderbird version 68.0 is only offered as direct download from thunderbird.net and not as upgrade from Thunderbird version 60 or earlier. A future version 68.1 will provide updates from earlier versions. Note that add-ons are only supported if add-on authors have adapted them.
• What’s New in Thunderbird 68 — Thunderbird 68 focuses on polish and setting the stage for future releases. There was a lot of work that we had to do below the surface that has made Thunderbird more future-proof and has made it a solid base to continue to build upon. But we also managed to create some great features you can touch today.
• Chrome OS gets first Chromebook Enterprise devices, faster Admin Console, and managed Linux environments — Google today announced a slew of Chrome Enterprise updates, including a faster Google Admin console and managed Linux environments. The company also unveiled the first Chromebook Enterprise laptops: Dell’s Latitude 5300 for $819 and Latitude 5400 for $699.
• GNOME Firmware Updater — A few months ago, Dell asked if I’d like to co-mentor an intern over the summer. The task was to create a GTK “power user” application for managing firmware. The idea being that someone like Dell support could ask the user to run a little application and then read back firmware versions or downgrade to an older firmware version rather than getting them to use the command line.
• GNOME Foundation launches Coding Education Challenge — The GNOME Foundation, with support from Endless, has announced the Coding Education Challenge, a competition aimed to attract projects that offer educators and students new and innovative ideas to teach coding with free and open source software. The $500,000 in funding will support the prizes, which will be awarded to the teams who advance through the three stages of the competition. 
• Telegram will launch its Gram cryptocurrency by October 31 or bust — Telegram’s cryptocurrency— the Gram — may be going public after all. The encrypted messaging app company plans to deliver “the first batches” of the coin in the next two months, according to a report at The New York Times.

Plus KDE 3 lives on, Endless ships on Asus, and major distros patch against Foreshadow.

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• Valve working to make Windows games work on Steam OS
• Endless OS shipping on Asus hardware
• Trinity Desktop R14.0.5 released
• Help LVFS gather NVMe data
• Linux 4.18 Arrives With Some Big Changes
• 4.18.3 is already out
• Major distros patched against Foreshadow

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• Endless OS 3.2 Released, Rebases From GNOME Shell 3.8 To 3.22 — On the UI side, there are big updates to its desktop with the re-basing process from GNOME Shell 3.8 to GNOME Shell 3.22. Moving forward, they intend to re-base their desktop changes much more often to allow for a smoother transition to using the newer GNOME code in their operating system.
• Tuxedo Announces Its Own Ubuntu Flavor — “What we have done is [deliver a] desktop that is strongly adapted to the needs of our users. With [our] own theme, own icons, own boot logo and […] the latest firmware, the latest NVIDIA drivers (if necessary) and Linux kernel 4.11 preinstalled! Not to mention our configuration adjustments on the GRUB and optimizations to other system-relevant files.”
• 2017 Linux Laptop Survey Results — There are 30,171 responses, a lot of data to now sift through while in this article is an overview of the initial findings.
• These Videos of Mycroft Are Just Too Funny — As an intended open-source alternative to Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri and Google Home, the humble Mycroft AI has an awful lot of hype to live up to.
• Youyota Sailfish OS 2-in-1 Tablet — The Youyota Tablet packs Quad-Core Intel chipsets, and runs on Sailfish OS.
• Mozilla launches Project Things IoT framework on Raspberry Pi — Mozilla has now announced its own Project Things framework designed to pull together existing Web of Things specifications and code under a global framework comprised of device, gateway, and cloud components. As a starting point, it released a prototype version of a Things Gateway stack that runs on a Raspberry Pi.