Longtime GNOME developer Richard Hughes has announced a new release of fwupd, the open-source utility for updating firmware on Linux in a safe, automatic, and reliable manner.

Fwupd continues advancing for making it much easier to upgrade firmware for many systems from the Linux desktop. Fwupd supports UEFI capsule updates and other interfaces while for end-users it can be run from the command-line or via front-ends like with GNOME Software integration. With today's first new release on their fwupd-0.8 branch, there are not only fixes but also new features.

Today's fwupd release adds support for Intel Thunderbolt devices, some Logitech Unifying devices, Synaptics MST cascaded hubs, support for the Altus-Metrum ChaosKey random number generator, and some new Dell-specific functionality.

Richard Hughes wrote on his personal blog regarding the Dell additions to fwupd, "Mario Limonciello from Dell has worked really hard on this release, and I can say with conviction: If you want to support a hardware company that cares about Linux — buy a Dell. They seem to be driving the importance of Linux support into their partners and suppliers. I wish other vendors would do the same."

Fwupd 0.8 can be downloaded from the project's GitHub repository.