TrueType is a widely used vector font standard for rendering text in web pages, PDFs, operating systems, and applications. Familiar fonts like Helvetica, Garamond, and Monaco are all built on TrueType outlines. The format specifies a hinting interpreter intended to help outlines rasterize faithfully on low-resolution displays. Modern high-resolution displays enable beautiful typography from outlines alone, but TrueType fonts that need hinting to render legibly remain in use and we continue to support them.
Font parsers process data from untrusted sources, making the TrueType hinting interpreter a security-critical attack surface. To make the format more resilient on Apple platforms, we rewrote its hinting interpreter from C to memory-safe Swift for the Fall 2025 releases. In addition to memory safety, we also improved performance: on average, our Swift interpreter runs 13% faster than the C interpreter it replaced.
To accompany this post, we’ve also published the source code of the Swift TrueType hinting interpreter. We hope sharing our experience helps others doing similar work in Swift.
A leaker with a strong Apple rumor track record says a touchscreen MacBook is "100% confirmed. If true, it would mark a major reversal for Apple, which has long argued that the Mac is built for indirect input rather than reaching up to touch a vertical screen. MacRumors reports: Instant Digital has a good track record for Apple rumors and has provided some strikingly accurate information in the past, so it's always worth noting what they have to say about Apple's plans. The claim is also backed by several recent reports. [...] Touchscreen support is expected to be one of several major upgrades coming to Apple's next-generation high-end MacBook Pro models. Other rumored features include M6 Pro and M6 Max chips, an OLED display, a Dynamic Island (i.e., no notch), and a thinner design. The new laptops could also adopt MacBook Ultra branding.
Notably, macOS 27 Golden Gate also introduces a more touch-friendly interface, since Apple's Sidecar feature now allows users to tap and interact with macOS interface elements using a finger on their iPad. Apple apparently is not going to advertise the new MacBook Pro/Ultra as a touch-first device like the iPad -- it will be "touch-friendly, not touch-first," according to [Bloomberg's Mark Gurman]. In that sense, Apple will let customers use touch and mouse gestures interchangeably for all functions. Further reading: Steve Jobs Was Wrong About Touchscreen Laptops (2012)
Hm! | Photo: Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images
Elon Musk's SpaceX IPO will probably make him the richest person to ever walk the planet. And while his mountain of horrible personal conduct could fill multiple books, one fact in particular stands out: A year ago, Musk's actions directly led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. He did it knowingly. And, worse - gleefully.
This is not a serious person, but his abuse of the world is deadly serious. In the first months of President Donald Trump's second term, the Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) destroyed the US Agency for International Development, whose mission was a boon to public health around the globe. M …
Rules max-depth and no-with now highlight only the first keyword.
Several errors in the calculations have been corrected in the max-depth and max-nested-callbacks rules. These bug fixes can result in reporting more linting errors in existing code.
WordPress already holds your content, media, users, plugins, and more.
But managing all of those moving pieces often means jumping between admin screens, browser tabs, and disconnected workflows.
Desktop Mode, a free and open source plugin built by Automattic, gives WordPress admin a desktop-style workspace.
Windows open, resize, and stack. A dock sits on the left. Virtual desktops let you switch between workflows. It runs on top of WordPress exactly as it is: your site, your plugins, your setup, all untouched.
Posts, pages, and media open as individual windows, so you can have a draft open next to your media library and drag files directly between them—no tab switching. No losing your place.
Send content to a shared folder so your team can review and approve it before it goes live. Restore anything from a unified Recycle Bin covering posts, pages, media, and comments, all from one place. Your window layout saves between sessions, so you pick up exactly where you left off.
A unified command palette (Cmd+K) gives you fast access to everything. The optional AI copilot lets you search across your content, find posts by topic, surface related pages, and get quick answers about what’s on your site. Multiple desktops, called Spaces, let you keep separate projects or workflows organized without cluttering your view.
Built to be extended
Desktop Mode comes with hundreds of hooks built in. Every significant behavior is extendable, meaning plugin authors can register native windows, dock items, desktop icons, commands, and AI tools from their own plugin with no patches to Desktop Mode required. You can even register your own AI provider, wiring Desktop Mode’s copilot to any model or service you choose.
Here’s what that looks like in practice: a booking plugin could open its calendar as a native window directly inside Desktop Mode instead of sending you to a separate admin page. A WooCommerce extension could surface your orders dashboard right in the dock. Nick, a long-time WordPress developer, built a native plugin on top of Desktop Mode to test this extensibility from day one, and it works.
Desktop Mode runs entirely in the admin layer, so your site’s frontend, your store, and your checkout are completely unaffected.
The same architecture that lets thousands of WordPress plugins coexist applies here. It’s open source, the code is on GitHub, and contributions are open.
What this opens up
WordPress has always been more than a publishing tool. It’s a platform built to be shaped, not just used. Desktop Mode is a bet on that idea.
What if the place where you manage your site also felt like a real workspace? Where your team can review content before it goes live, your tools open where you need them, and you stop losing time navigating between screens? That’s what we’re building toward.
Already running on hundreds of sites in its first week, it’s actively maintained by Automattic and the community is building on it. This is the foundation and we can’t wait to see where it goes.
Try WordPress desktop mode: It’s free
Desktop Mode is free for all WordPress users and available today.
Most devs over‑optimize the model 🤖 The real leverage is in the system 🔧 Tweaking prompts & swapping models ≠better outcomes Giving AI the right data + context = better reasoning + results Build the pipeline, not just the prompt.
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