I believe Wayland just replaces X11 on local graphics

Story: Objectives, Wayland in F24, Flock talk deadline, QA heroes, conference metricsTotal Replies: 9
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BFM

Mar 13, 2016
4:29 PM EDT
On a local machines Wayland would replace X11 until graphics is required across networks. Then an X11 module inserts to handle networked graphics. That is how it was originally specified. That might have changed as I haven't looked at this in some time. Does anyone have additional information?
JaseP

Mar 14, 2016
3:01 AM EDT
I'm pretty sure you're correct about that. I'm pretty sure that Wayland doesn't have networked graphics server export capabilities. X11 will continue to be relevant for a very long time after Wayland becomes standard, for that and a lot of other reasons.
nmset

Mar 14, 2016
4:55 AM EDT
>X11 will continue to be relevant...

Yes, but would distros drop X11 ? That's not something easy to build, install and make work. Some distros might feed it to users via optional repositories, others won't care. Much trouble and talks ahead !
JaseP

Mar 14, 2016
8:16 AM EDT
What's so hard about it?!?! What makes it harder than any other package?!?! So many other packages depend on an X-server that it would be necessary to make it work for interoperability purposes. Plus, a lot of the things that makes an X-server so hard to make work are the hardware identification things that would still need to take place on a Wayland server...
cybertao

Mar 14, 2016
8:30 AM EDT
Wayland is a replacement for the X server, with an X11 interface for backwards compatibility. Wouldn't it be possible to have a remote X client send messages to the local Wayland/X server?
JaseP

Mar 14, 2016
8:57 AM EDT
Quoting: Wouldn't it be possible to have a remote X client send messages to the local Wayland/X server?


That's the way the backwards compatibility works, I believe...

The X-server is a compatibility layer running on the Wayland server... I'm pretty sure that the concept is not too different from the way that PulseAudio is supposed to work with Alsa...
skelband

Mar 14, 2016
1:57 PM EDT
My understanding is that Wayland replaces the rendering component of X11. An X11 wayland client will take the place of X11 as it stands now to handle device and network support. On an implementation of this kind, both X11 and native Wayland applications will be possible at the same time.

My intuition is that Wayland has been needed for a long time now. X11 is pretty un-unixy in its design, encompassing network, graphics support and input device handling, it's pretty much the monolithic monster that good design should try to avoid. Such a large monolithic component is hard to evolve since there are so many inter-related parts. Breaking it up will be good for the ecosystem.

In contrast, Wayland and the Weston implementation is trying to implement well the single, compositor piece.
JaseP

Mar 15, 2016
8:00 AM EDT
Yeah,... Wayland will be an improvement, when it's ready to be released... Kinda the way Hurd will be a good kernel when it's ready, too... (Sorry,... But it's vaporware tendencies deserve that snide remark).
skelband

Mar 15, 2016
12:25 PM EDT
Wayland, or should I say Weston, has been available for quite a while now. I tried out the Rebecca Black OS some time ago and it does work quite well. As with a lot of this kind of tech, it's wanting in the driver support and application area. Personally, I think 2016 will be the year of Weston. Perhaps the advent of Vulkan will make this a lot easier as we see a revolution in the graphics driver department anyway.
skelband

Mar 15, 2016
1:05 PM EDT
More info here:

https://tlhp.cf/the-review-of-wayland-progress/

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