Flatpak has released version 1.16, marking a significant update to its Linux application sandboxing and distribution framework. This release comes two and a half years after version 1.14 and introduces several new features and enhancements.

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Key Features of Flatpak 1.16

• USB Device Listing: Users can now list USB devices.
• KDE Search Completion: Improved support for search completion in KDE environments.
• Build System Update: Flatpak can now be compiled using Meson instead of Autotools.
• Wayland Socket Creation: A new security context extension allows the creation of private Wayland sockets, enabling the compositor to recognize connections from sandboxed applications.
• Enhanced Compatibility with Wine: The modify_ldt system call is now allowed with the --allow=multiarch option, facilitating the execution of 16-bit executables in certain Wine versions.
• HTTP Backend Variable: A new variable in flatpak.pc helps projects like GNOME Software determine compatibility with the libflatpak library.

Additional Improvements

• Temporary Directory Cleanup: An automatic cleanup mechanism for old temporary deploy directories is now implemented.
• Input Device Access: The addition of a --device=input option allows access to evdev devices located in /dev/input.
• Terminal Emulator Support: Terminal emulators can now detect and display the progress of Flatpak operations more effectively.
• New API for App Replacement: The flatpak_transaction_add_rebase_and_uninstall() API improves the reliability of replacing end-of-life Flatpak applications.
• Environment Variable Inheritance: Sub-sandboxes initiated by flatpak-portal will inherit environment variables from the original flatpak run command, enhancing functionality for variables like FLATPAK_GL_DRIVERS.

System Enhancements

• Automatic removal of obsolete driver versions and pruned references is now supported.
• D-Bus session bus configuration reloads automatically after app installations or upgrades.
• Kerberos authentication can now be utilized without requiring sandbox exceptions.

New Environment Variables

• FLATPAK_DATA_DIR: Overrides the data directory used for configuration file searches.
• FLATPAK_DOWNLOAD_TMPDIR: Allows specification of alternative download directories.
• FLATPAK_TTY_PROGRESS: Re-enables terminal progress indicators.

Flatpak 1.16 also enhances accessibility features, allowing apps like WebKit to connect to the AT-SPI accessibility tree across processes in sub-sandboxes. Additionally, users can now run commands with flatpak run -vv $app_id to view detailed sandboxing parameters as debug messages.

This major release is available for download on GitHub, but users are advised to update through their Linux distribution’s software repositories for optimal integration. The Flatpak development team encourages all users and distributions to promptly upgrade to this latest version.