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Latest AI tool releases, research breakthroughs, and industry news.
Yesterday
sqlite-utils 4.0rc2, mostly written by Claude Fable
I wrote about the sqlite-utils 4.0rc1 release a couple of weeks ago. Since we only have Claude Fable on our Max subscriptions for a few more days, I decided to see if it could help me get to a 4.0 stable release that I felt truly comfortable about, since I try to keep to SemVer and like my incompatible major versions to be as rare as possible. I started with this prompt, in Claude Code for web on my iPhone: Final review before shipping a stable 4.0 release - very important to spot any last minute things that would be a breaking change if we fix them later Here's that initial report it created for me. There were some significant problems that I hadn't myself encountered yet - 5 that Fable categorized as "release blockers". Here's the worst of the bunch: 1. delete_where() never commits and poisons the connection (data loss) Table.delete_where() ( sqlite_utils/db.py:2948 ) runs its DELETE via a bare self.db.execute() with no atomic() wrapper — compare Table.delete() at db.py:2944 , which wraps correctly. The connection is left in_transaction=True , so every subsequent atomic() call takes the savepoint branch ( db.py:430-440 ) and never commits either. Reproduced end-to-end: db = sqlite_utils . Database ( "dw.db" ) db [ "t" ]. insert_all ([{ "id" : i } for i in range ( 3 )], pk = "id" ) db [ "t" ]. delete_where ( "id = ?" , [ 0 ]) # conn.in_transaction is now True db [ "t" ]. insert ({ "id" : 50 }) db [ "u" ]. insert ({ "a" : 1 }) db . close () # Reopen: rows are [0, 1, 2] — the delete, row 50, AND table u are all gone. That's a really bad bug! Very glad I didn't ship that, although at least it would have been a bug I could fix in a 4.0.1 point release, not a design flaw that would force a 5.0. Over the course of 37 prompts, 34 commits and +1,321 -190 code changes over 30 separate files, we worked through the entire set of feedback in turn, making several other design improvements along the way. A weird thing about coding agents is that harder tasks like this one actual
sqlite-utils 4.0rc2
Release: sqlite-utils 4.0rc2 See sqlite-utils 4.0rc2, mostly written by Claude Fable (for about $149.25) .
Earlier this week
Open Source AI Gap Map
Open Source AI Gap Map Current AI is "a global partnership building a public option for AI", founded as a non-profit at the AI Action Summit in Paris in February 2025 and backed by serious capital ($400m already committed). They launched their Gap Map a couple of days ago - an attempt at indexing the current state of open source AI: The Gap Map v0.1 details 421 products in depth: 266 software tools and libraries, 85 models, 50 datasets, and 20 hardware projects, produced by 228 organizations. These products are organized into 14 categories across 3 layers of the stack (model components, product / UX, and infrastructure). The remaining 24,400 artifacts constitute the uncategorized long tail of the open source AI ecosystem, and will carry no score until they are researched and cited. The map itself is interesting to explore, but I'm more excited about the underlying data - released under an MIT license in the currentai-org/os-ai-map GitHub account: 1,184 YAML files plus the notebooks, schemas and other scripts used to help gather them. Since the files are on GitHub you can use Datasette Lite to explore some of them - here are 16,185 GitHub repos the project is tracking as a CSV file loaded into Datasette Lite. Tags: open-source , ai , datasette-lite , generative-ai , local-llms , llms
Anthropic wants to develop its own drugs
At the event "The Briefing: AI for Science" earlier this week, Anthropic announced Claude Science, a new "AI workbench for scientists" that pulls fragmented tools and datasets into one environment, and generates figures and visuals. Anthropic, already dominating the industry with its popular coding tools and powerful AI models, framed the launch around what it says is AI's potential to "dramatically accelerate the pace of scientific discovery and the development of healthcare interventions," and touted a long list of biotech and pharma customers already using Claude. Anthropic also went a step further, saying it would develop drugs of its … Read the full story at The Verge.
A behind-the-scenes look at Midjourney’s medical scanner leaves many questions unanswered
A scan of an imaging phantom, segmented to validate how cleanly structures separate under controlled conditions. | Image: Midjourney Medical Midjourney has shown more of its futuristic medical scanner. It still hasn't shown much proof it works. The AI startup, best known for generating images, released a behind-the-scenes video of its dunk-tank ultrasound scanner, which it plans to deploy in spas and hopes will transform medicine with cheap, detailed, radiation-free imaging. The nearly 20-minute tour comes from tech YouTuber Marcin Plaza, who also happens to be an engineer at the company. Plaza frankly describes the scanner as scores of ultrasound probes "hacked apart and slapped on a glorified hot tub with an elevator in it," connected to off-the-shelf computers and Raspberry … Read the full story at The Verge.
llm-coding-agent 0.1a0
Release: llm-coding-agent 0.1a0 Another Fable 5 experiment. Now that my LLM library has evolved into more of an agent framework it's time to see what a simple coding agent would look like built on it. I started a new Python library using my python-lib-template-repository GitHub template repository, then ran these two prompts (here's the Claude Code for web transcript ): Write a spec.md for this project - it will depend on the latest “llm” alpha from PyPI and implement a Claude code style coding agent complete with tools for reading and editing files and executing commands Then: Commit the spec, then build it using red/green TDD in a series of sensible commits (each with passing tests and updated docs) - occasionally manually test it using the OpenAI API key in your environment Here's the resulting README file and the sequence of commits . I've shipped a slop-alpha to PyPI, so you can run the new agent like this: uvx --prerelease=allow --with llm-coding-agent llm code It's pretty good for a first attempt! Here's the (Fable-authored) README , which lists recipes like llm code --yolo and llm code --allow "pytest*" --allow "git diff*" . It also presents a Python API based around a CodingAgent(model="gpt-5.5", root="/path", approve=True).run("Fix the failing test in tests/test_parser.py") class which I didn't ask for but I'm delighted to see implemented. Here's the suite of tools it implemented , listed using uvx ... llm tools : CodingTools_edit_file(path: str, old_string: str, new_string: str, replace_all: bool = False) -> str Replace an exact string in a file. old_string must match the file contents exactly (including whitespace) and must identify a unique location unless replace_all is true. Returns a diff of the change so it can be verified. CodingTools_execute_command(command: str, timeout: int = 120) -> str Run a shell command in the session root directory. Returns combined stdout and stderr followed by an Exit code line. timeout is in seconds (maximum 600); on tim
Meta quietly launches vibe-coded gaming app Pocket
Meta has quietly launched Pocket, an experimental AI app that lets users generate and share interactive mini games using text prompts.
Anthropic is discussing a new custom chip with Samsung
The news comes about a week after OpenAI announced its own custom AI chip in a partnership with Broadcom.
The latest AI news we announced in June 2026
Here are Google’s latest AI updates from June 2026.
Cloudflare’s new policy pushes AI companies to pay for publishers’ content
Cloudflare is giving AI companies until September 15 to separate web crawlers used for search from those used for AI training and agents, or risk being blocked by default on many publisher sites.
After spooking Trump into safety testing, Anthropic AI models get global release
US lifts curbs on Anthropic’s advanced Fable and Mythos models.
Gemini Spark, Google’s agentic assistant, is now available on Mac
Google's 24/7 agentic assistant, Gemini Spark, comes to Mac alongside other improvements, like real-time tracking and support for more apps.
Google built a great smart speaker, but Gemini isn’t ready for it
The Google Home Speaker is Google’s first smart speaker in years. And it’s pretty! | Photo: Jennifer Patison Tuohy / The Verge Smart speakers have spent the past few years searching for a compelling second act. Beyond music, timers, and controlling your lights, they've struggled to justify taking up space on the kitchen counter. AI promised to change that. Amazon debuted its new hardware powered by a revamped Alexa last fall, and now it's finally Google's turn. The Google Home Speaker is the company's first new smart speaker in six years and its first "built for Gemini." After years of neglect, Google appears to be finally getting serious about the smart home - again. The new speaker is the clearest sign yet. Gemini for Home, however, still feels unfinished. Google … Read the full story at The Verge.
[AINews] Sonnet 5 today, and Fable 5 tomorrow
Everything is open again!
Trump drops restrictions on Anthropic’s Mythos and Fable models
The Trump administration's erratic approach to AI policymaking has left companies across the industry with little clarity about what will govern future model releases.
Anthropic’s long-sidelined Fable 5 is greenlit to return
After weeks of negotiating with the Trump administration, Anthropic is finally going to be able to bring Claude Fable 5 back online. In a post on X, Anthropic said it plans to begin restoring access Wednesday to users globally on Claude platforms, and that the company would re-enable access on AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Foundry soon, but with no set timeline. Anthropic wrote: We've received notice that the Department of Commerce has lifted export controls on Claude Fable 5 and Mythos 5. We'll begin restoring access tomorrow, and will share an update soon. We're grateful to our users for their patience, and to everyone who work … Read the full story at The Verge.
Hugging Face and Cerebras bring Gemma 4 to real-time voice AI
Nano Banana 2 Lite
Nano Banana 2 Lite Also known as Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite Image ( gemini-3.1-flash-lite-image in their API ), this is the "fastest and cheapest Gemini image model, engineered for velocity and scale". I used AI studio to run this prompt: Do a where's Waldo style image but it's where is the raccoon holding a ham radio I like that one better than the results I got from the other Nano Banana models when I tried this back in April. It spelled Forest Festival wrong in two different ways though. Via Hacker News Tags: google , ai , generative-ai , llms , gemini , text-to-image , llm-release , nano-banana
OpenClaw is finally available on Android and iOS
The free open source agentic program is finally invading your phone.
Claude Science is Anthropic’s newest flagship product
At an event for pharmaceutical executives, biotech founders, and researchers on Tuesday, Anthropic announced Claude Science, a major new product intended to support scientific research in the same way that Claude Code supports software engineering. Like Claude Code, Claude Science can autonomously carry out meaningful work when given concise, high-level instructions, and it has access…