Wayland: beyond X
Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 13th Feb 2012 23:44 UTC
X11, Window Managers "Although current discussion of the Linux desktop tends to focus on the disharmony around Unity and the GNOME shell, the true revolution on the desktop is taking place out of sight of users. The Wayland display server is expected to reach version 1.0 later this year, and is seen by many as the long term replacement for the X Window System, with real potential to improve and transform the performance of the desktop for Linux users."
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tuma324
Member since:
2010-04-09

"From the FAQ: "X will always be there on the side."

X is effectively the remote desktop protocol for Linux. The only strangeness has been that Linux has used "remote desktop" on the local machine as well. Wayland basically gives an app direct access to the compositor.

I hope like hell that this is only implemented for games or other "special" applications, and that toolkits like GTK and QT add Wayland support for better performance. I'd hate to lose the ability to realistically use a linux desktop remotely.


From my own reading on Wayland, X isn't being kept for remoting - it's being kept for compatibility, since apps compiled for X aren't going to go away any time soon. Support for remoting is incidental to that.

For native Wayland apps, the hypothetical solution to remoting involves a custom compositor - the app has direct access to *a* compositor, but it's one that simply proxies everything across a network to the real one.

(Hypothetical because nobody has actually done it, but this is how the Wayland guys think remoting should be done - in the compositor, not in the rendering API where apps have to deal with it.) "

Great explanation, I wish someone will write a network-transparent compositor using Wayland.

So we can debunk the myth that "Wayland won't be able to do network transparency" and so that people can actually learn how Wayland works.

Edited 2012-02-14 03:57 UTC

Reply Parent Score: 4

Delgarde Member since:
2008-08-19

So we can debunk the myth that "Wayland won't be able to do network transparency" and so that people can actually learn how Wayland works.


Good luck on that. The information is already there for anyone to read - that's why I'm able to comment on the subject, from having read what the developers have said on the mailing lists.

But the people who spread myths generally aren't the kind of people who are interested in spending time learning how things actually work - if they were, they'd have done it, and wouldn't be spreading myths. They read the the summary and comments on news sites, and don't bother following the links to get the details.

Reply Parent Score: 4

tuma324 Member since:
2010-04-09

"So we can debunk the myth that "Wayland won't be able to do network transparency" and so that people can actually learn how Wayland works.


Good luck on that. The information is already there for anyone to read - that's why I'm able to comment on the subject, from having read what the developers have said on the mailing lists.

But the people who spread myths generally aren't the kind of people who are interested in spending time learning how things actually work - if they were, they'd have done it, and wouldn't be spreading myths. They read the the summary and comments on news sites, and don't bother following the links to get the details. "

Exactly, that's why I'd like to see someone with the right skills to show up and write a network-transparent compositor for Wayland.

That will silent all the people crying and spreading FUD.

If I only had the skills...

Edited 2012-02-14 05:11 UTC

Reply Parent Score: 4

r_a_trip Member since:
2005-07-06

They read the the summary and comments on news sites, and don't bother following the links to get the details.

Or maybe they do and lack the technological depth in display technology to make heads or tails of it. Then it becomes a game of following the most convincing comments.

The first cries were "Wayland can't do remote windowing". Now we are at the stage that "Wayland can possibly do remoting of a window, but it hasn't been implemented (yet) and it isn't a high priority."

I'm quite the simpleton when it comes to technology. When I first heard that Wayland couldn't do remoting, I thought that would be a loss over X.

After that I thought, if the system can send multiple windows over an HDMI wire to a display screen, at least it should be able to do the same over a network cable.

Now that the internal architecture is becoming more clear, it seems feasible to use a "compositing relay" that sends the individual screenbuffers remotely to another Weston compositor on a different machine.

I could be way of the mark here, but that is what I plussed together from info over Wayland out of articles and, more importantly, comments.

Reply Parent Score: 2

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