Linux is just the kernel dude. Everything else, is basically user space afaik.
The big difference is that currently with X11, the whole X server runs essentially as root with access to shared memory and is one huge monolithic process with 30 year old spaghetti code in it that was never written with any sort of security (or concept of hardware acceleration) in mind.
This is where X11 is.
Wayland is an attempt to
- untangle the mess
- split out the privileged code to a much smaller subset of the program so the rest can run non-privileged to reduce the attack surface
As to X12? Well… Wayland pretty much IS X12. Its written by people who have worked with the X11 code base and, knowing what it is like, decided it is a lost cause.
The “typical end user” sees no benefit from the 30 (plus) years of legacy shit in X11 either. As i mentioned above, people bitch that they will lose X11 remoting, however this is trivially achieved with running an X remote display server on whatever platform of your choice (they are available for macOS, Windows and will be for wayland if not already) without needing to run full X11 (as root) as the machine’s low level display subsystem.
And that’s even if you want to do X11 remoting. Which, in 2019, if this is a desire of yours then i would question your sanity, because its complete and utter trash vs. well… any other remote display protocol released in the past 25 years.
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Even unix gods think X is brain damaged
I wonder if wayland handles screens the same way x11 does. I tried to do a screen share with a friend in discord the other day and x11 seems to treat the two displays I have (more or less) as one. At least discord sees them as one and no matter what you select it shows both screens. Witch is completely useless, because then everything is so small that you arent able to read anything.
Here’s my question. How much of that ‘‘legacy’’ code is still used? Couldn’t it just be pulled from X11? Wouldn’t that just make it that much better? Does X11 HAVE to run as root? And if so why?
I only ask because I’m curious.
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why do i get the feeling it wasn’t explained as such to most or that bit of info was NOT passed along.
On the server and dev side it probably is used. instead of gimping an already over incumbent code base that does have it’s features AND bugs used i can see why they are trying to make a new code base, especially with HW acceleration. especially if your going to end up running the x11 and the new x11 without legacy code side by side in different release then you might as well start with a new foundation.
look “it’s not a bug it’s feature” there is a clip of some dev complaining to Linus Torvalds that some new release of something removed a feature he was using and Linus was like
“You’re a dumb ass that shouldn’t even work, that was a bug that should have been reported”
And that’s another issues with 30 years old code worked on an coded by 5K developers but, starting fresh and finding a good time to switch over and get nvidia on board is just a big of a hurdle.
As I see it wayland is winning.
You can keep rawdoggin it with x11 and stick it in the network as well.
But 3d / performance on the local instance needs it all in bag for speed. The twitch based gammers demand less lag !
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It has been, in plenty of developer presentations on wayland and why it exists.
What happened is the internet rabble saw “der terk mer x11s!!!” and started bitching about Wayland just, well… because WAYLAND!! And because someone said it on the internet, it must be true, and it snowballed.
X11 (including its shit-house implementation of remote desktop) is horrible. Let it die.
Like i said above, if you need to run X11 on top of something else for remoting (though god knows why you’d want to the 21st century), you can.
Even macOS can do it…
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Wayland has provided smoother graphics for me and better support of the newer AMDGPU features. That being said, the fact that it doesn’t detect when videos are playing to prevent suspension in the middle of media has been a huge boner killer. So has the inability to disable the compositor for fullscreen applications or to even use OBS effectively. Wayland will probably be ready in 5 more years.
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That’s the one un contested thing i’ve read, is that X11 has so much legacy and some incorrect code that gets sued in way it was not meant to be that it has become from what i can tell undoubtedly cumbersome.
I often see comments about Wayland performance being lower & latency being higher. Low latency on a 240hz screen on desktop apps & browsers is what I care about… Would be good to see some benchmarks using testufo.com and the rest. No benchmarks comparing Wayland and X yet? I’m only interested in what will work best with minimal WMs like DWM.
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