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Think twice about Wayland. It breaks everything!
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Wayland.md

Think twice before abandoning Xorg. Wayland breaks everything!

Hence, if you are interested in existing applications to "just work" without the need for adjustments, then you may be better off avoiding Wayland.

Wayland solves no issues I have but breaks almost everything I need. Even the most basic, most simple things (like xkill) - in this case with no obvious replacement. And usually it stays broken, because the Wayland folks mostly seem to care about Automotive, Gnome, maybe KDE - and alienating everyone else (e.g., people using just an X11 window manager or something like GNUstep) in the process.

As 2024 is winding down:

For the record, even in the latest Raspberry Pi OS you still can't drag a file from inside a zip file onto the desktop for it to be extracted. So drag-and-drop is still broken for me.

And Qt move() on a window still doesn't work like it does on all other desktop platforms (and the Wayland folks think that is good).

And global menus still don't work (outside of not universally implemented things like qt_extended_surface set_generic_property).

The Wayland project seems to operate like they were starting a greenfield project, whereas at the same time they try to position Wayland as "the X11 successor", which would clearly require a lot of thought about not breaking, or at least providing a smooth upgrade path for, existing software.

In fact, it is merely an incompatible alternative, and not even one that has (nor wants to have) feature parity (missing features). And unlike X11 (the X Window System), Wayland protocol designers actively avoid the concept of "windows" (making up incomprehensible words like "xdg_toplevel" instead).

DO NOT USE A WAYLAND SESSION! Let Wayland not destroy everything and then have other people fix the damage it caused. Or force more Red Hat/Gnome components (glib, Portals, Pipewire) on everyone!

Please add more examples to the list.

Wayland seems to be made by people who do not care for existing software. They assume everyone is happy to either rewrite everything or to just use Gnome on Linux (rather than, say, twm with ROX Filer on NetBSD).

Edit: When I wrote the above, I didn't really realize what Wayland even was, I just noticed that some distributions (like Fedora) started pushing it onto me and things didn't work properly there. Today I realize that you can't "install Wayland", because unlike Xorg, there is not one "Wayland display server" but actually every desktop envrironment has its own. And maybe "the Wayland folks" don't "only care about Gnome", but then, any fix that is done in Gnome's Wayland implementation isn't automatically going to benefit all users of Wayland-based software, and possibly isn't even the implementation "the Wayland folks" would necessarily recommend.

Edit 12/2023: If something wants to replace X11 for desktop computers (such as professional Unix workstations), then it better support all needed features (and key concepts, like windows) for that use case. That people also have displays on their fridge doesn't matter the least bit in that context of discussion. Let's propose the missing Wayland protocols for full X11 feature parity.

Edit 08/2024: "Does Wayland becoming the defacto standard display server for Linux serve to marginalize BSD?" https://fossforce.com/2024/07/the-unintended-consequences-linuxs-wayland-adoption-will-have-on-bsd/

Wayland is broken by design

  • A crash in the window manager takes down all running applications
  • You cannot run applications as root
  • You cannot do a lot of things that you can do in Xorg by design
  • There is not one /usr/bin/wayland display server application that is desktop environment agnostic and is used by everyone (unlike with Xorg)
  • It offloads a lot of work to each and every window manager. As a result, the same basic features get implemented differently in different window managers, with different behaviors and bugs - so what works on desktop environment A does not necessarily work in desktop environment B (e.g., often you hear that something "works in Wayland", even though it only really works on Gnome and KDE, not in all Wayland implementations). This summarizes it very well: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayland/wayland/-/issues/233

Apparently the Wayland project doesn't even want to be "X.org 2.0", and doesn't want to provide a commonly used implementation of a compositor that could be used by everyone: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayland/wayland/-/issues/233. Yet this would imho be required if they want to make it into a worthwile "successor" that would have any chance of ever fixing the many Wayland issues at the core.

Wayland breaks screen recording applications

  • MaartenBaert/ssr#431 ❌ broken since 24 Jan 2016, no resolution ("I guess they use a non-standard GNOME interface for this")
  • https://github.com/mhsabbagh/green-recorder ❌ ("I am no longer interested in working with things like ffmpeg/wayland/GNOME's screencaster or solving the issues related to them or why they don't work")
  • vkohaupt/vokoscreenNG#51 ❌ broken since at least 7 Mar 2020. ("I have now decided that there will be no Wayland support for the time being. Reason, there is no budget for it. Let's see how it looks in a year or two.") - This is the key problem. Wayland breaks everything and then expects others to fix the wreckage it caused on their own expense.
  • obsproject/obs-studio#2471 ❌ broken since at least 7 Mar 2020. ("Wayland is unsupported at this time", "There isn't really something that can just be easily changed. Wayland provides no capture APIs")
  • There is a workaround for OBS Studio that requires a obs-xdg-portal plugin (which is known to be Red Hat/Flatpak-centric, GNOME-centric, "perhaps" works with other desktops)
  • phw/peek#1191 ❌ broken since 14 Jan 2023. Peek, a screen recording tool, has been abandoned by its developerdue to a number of technical challenges, mostly with Gtk and Wayland ("Many of these have to do with how Wayland changed the way applications are being handled")

As of February 2024, screen recording is still broken utterly on Wayland with the vast majority of tools. Proof

Workaround: Find a Wayland compositor that supports the wlr-screencopy-unstable-v1 protocol and use wf-recorder -a. The default compositor in Raspberry Pi OS (Wayfire) does, but the default compositor in Ubuntu doesn't. (That's the worst part of Wayland: Unlike with Xorg, it always depends on the particular Wayand compositor what works and what is broken. Is there even one that supports everything?)

Wayland breaks screen sharing applications

  • jitsi/jitsi-meet#2350 ❌ broken since 3 Jan 2018
  • jitsi/jitsi-meet#6389 ❌ broken since 24 Jan 2016 ("Closing since there is nothing we can do from the Jitsi Meet side.") See? Wayland breaks stuff and leaves application developers helpless and unable to fix the breakage, even if they wanted.

NOTE: As of November 2023, screen sharing in Chromium using Jitsi Meet is still utterly broken, both in Raspberry Pi OS Desktop, and in a KDE Plasma installation, albeit with different behavior. Note that Pipewire, Portals and whatnot are installed, and even with them it does not work.

Wayland breaks automation software

sudo pkg install py37-autokey

This is an X11 application, and as such will not function 100% on 
distributions that default to using Wayland instead of Xorg.

Wayland breaks Gnome-Global-AppMenu (global menus for Gnome)

Wayland broke global menus with KDE platformplugin

Good news: According to this report global menus now work with KDE platformplugin as of 4/2022

Wayland breaks global menus with non-KDE Qt platformplugins

Wayland breaks AppImages that don't ship a special Wayland Qt plugin

  • https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2018/03/unsetting-qt_qpa_platform-environment-variable-by-default/ ❌ broke AppImages that don't ship a special Wayland Qt plugin. "This affects proprietary applications, FLOSS applications bundled as appimages, FLOSS applications bundled as flatpaks and not distributed by KDE and even the Qt installer itself. In my opinion this is a showstopper for running a Wayland session." However, there is a workaround: "AppImages which ship just the XCB plugin will automatically fallback to running in xwayland mode" (see below).

Wayland breaks Redshift

Update 2023: Some Wayland compositors (such as Wayfire) now support wlr_gamma_control_unstable_v1, see https://github.com/WayfireWM/wayfire/wiki/Tutorial#configuring-wayfire and jonls/redshift#663. Does it work in all Wayland compositors though?

Wayland breaks global hotkeys

Wayland does not work for Xfce?

See below.

Wayland does not work properly on NVidia hardware?

Apparently Wayland relies on nouveau drivers for NVidia hardware. The nouveau driver has been giving unsatisfactory performance since its inception. Even clicking on the application starter icon in Gnome results in a stuttery animation. Only the proprietary NVidia driver results in full performance.

See below.

Update 2024: The situation might slowly be improving. It remains to be seen whether this will work well also for all existing old Nvidia hardware (that works well in Xorg).

Wayland does not work properly on Intel hardware

Wayland prevents GUI applications from running as root

  • https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1274451 ❌ broken since 22 Oct 2015 ("No this will only fix sudo for X11 applications. Running GUI code as root is still a bad idea." I absolutely detest it when software tries to prevent me from doing what some developer thinks is "a bad idea" but did not consider my use case, e.g., running truss for debugging on FreeBSD needs to run the application as root. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1323302 suggests it is not possible: "These sorts of security considerations are very much the way that "the Linux desktop" is going these days".)

Suggested solution

Wayland is biased toward Linux and breaks BSD

  • https://blog.netbsd.org/tnf/entry/wayland_on_netbsd_trials_and ❌ broken since 28 Sep 2020 ("Wayland is written with the assumption of Linux to the extent that every client application tends to #include <linux/input.h> because Wayland's designers didn't see the need to define a OS-neutral way to get mouse button IDs. (...) In general, Wayland is moving away from the modularity, portability, and standardization of the X server. (...) I've decided to take a break from this, since it's a fairly huge undertaking and uphill battle. Right now, X11 combined with a compositor like picom or xcompmgr is the more mature option."

Wayland complicates server-side window decorations

  • https://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2018/01/server-side-decorations-and-wayland/ ❌ FUD since at least 27 January 2018 ("I heard that GNOME is currently trying to lobby for all applications implementing client-side decorations. One of the arguments seems to be that CSD is a must on Wayland. " ... "I’m burnt from it and are not interested in it any more.") Server-side window decorations are what make the title bar and buttons of all windows on a system consistent. They are a must have_ for a consistent system, so that applications written e.g., Gtk will not look entirely alien on e.g., a Qt based desktop, and to enforce that developers cannot place random controls into window titles where they do not belong. Client-side decorations, on the other hand, are destroying uniformity and consistency, put additional burden on application and toolkit developers, and allow e.g., GNOME developers to put random controls (that do not belong there) into window titles (like buttons), hence making it more difficult to achieve a uniform look and feel for all applications regardless of the toolkit being used.

Red Hat employee Matthias Clasen ("I work at the Red Hat Desktop team... I am actually a manager there... the people who do the actual work work for me") expicitly stated "Client-side everything" as a principle, even though the protocol doesn't enforce it: "Fonts, Rendering, Nested Windows, Decorations. "It also gives the design more freedom to use the titlebar space, which is something our designers appreciate" (sic). Source

Wayland breaks windows rasing/activating themselves

Wayland breaks RescueTime

Wayland breaks window managers

Apparently Wayland (at least as implemented in KWin) does not respect EWMH protocols, and breaks other command line tools like wmctrl, xrandr, xprop, etc. Please see the discussion below for details.

Wayland requires JWM, TWM, XDM, IceWM,... to reimplement Xorg-like functionality

  • Screen recording and casting
  • Querying of the mouse position, keyboard LED state, active window position or name, moving windows (xdotool, wmctrl)
  • Global shortcuts
  • System tray
  • Input Method support/editor (IME)
  • Graphical settings management (i.e. tools like xranrd)
  • Fast user switching/multiple graphical sessions
  • Session configuration including but not limited to 1) input devices 2) monitors configuration including refresh rate / resolution / scaling / rotation and power saving 3) global shortcuts
  • HDR/deep color support
  • VRR (variable refresh rate)
  • Disabling input devices (xinput alternative)

As it currently stands minor WMs and DEs do not even intend to support Wayland given the sheer complexity of writing all the code required to support the above features. You do not expect JWM, TWM, XDM or even IceWM developers to implement all the featured outlined in ^1.

Wayland breaks _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR protocol

  • https://git.521000.bestelectron/electron#33226 ("skipTaskbar has no effect on Wayland. Currently Electron uses _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR to tell the WM to hide an app from the taskbar, and this works fine on X11 but there's no equivalent mechanism in Wayland." Workarounds are only available for some desktops including GNOME and KDE Plasma.) ❌ broken since March 10, 2022

Wayland breaks NoMachine NX

Wayland breaks xclip

xclip is a command line utility that is designed to run on any system with an X11 implementation. It provides an interface to X selections ("the clipboard"). Apparently Wayland isn't compatible to the X11 clipboard either.

This is another example that the Wayland requires everyone to change components and take on additional work just because Wayland is incompatible to what we had working for all those years.

Wayland breaks SUDO_ASKPASS

Wayland breaks X11 atoms

X11 atoms can be used to store information on windows. For example, a file manager might store the path that the window represents in an X11 atom, so that it (and other applications) can know for which paths there are open file manager windows. Wayland is not compatible to X11 atoms, resulting in all software that relies on them to be broken until specifically ported to Wayland (which, in the case of legacy software, may well be never).

Possible workaround (to be verified): Use the (Qt proprietary?) Extended Surface Wayland protocol casually mentioned in https://blog.broulik.de/2016/10/global-menus-returning/ "which allows you to set (and read?) arbitrary properties on a window". Is it the set_generic_property from https://github.com/qt/qtwayland/blob/dev/src/extensions/surface-extension.xml?

Wayland breaks games

Games are developed for X11. And if you run a game on Wayland, performance is subpar due to things like forced vsync. Only recently, some Wayland implementations (like KDE KWin) let you disable that.

Wayland breaks xdotool

(Details to be added; apparently no 1:1 drop-in replacement available?)

Wayland breaks xkill

xkill (which I use on a regular basis) does not work with Wayland applications.

What is the equivalent for Wayland applications?

Wayland breaks screensavers

Is it true that Wayland also breaks screensavers? https://www.jwz.org/blog/2023/09/wayland-and-screen-savers/

Wayland breaks setting the window position

Other platforms (Windows, Mac, other destop environments) can set the window position on the screen, so all cross-platform toolkits and applications expect to do the same on Wayland, but Wayland can't (doesn't want to) do it.

  • PCSX2/pcsx2#10179 PCX2 (Playstation 2 Emulator) ❌ broken since 2023-10-25 ("Disables Wayland, it's super broken/buggy in basically every scenario. KDE isn't too buggy, GNOME is a complete disaster.")

Wayland breaks color mangement

Apparently color management as of 2023 (well over a decade of Wayland development) is still in the early "thinking" stage, all the while Wayland is already being pushed on people as if it was a "X11 successor".

https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pq/color-and-hdr/-/blob/main/doc/color-management-model.md

Wayland breaks DRM leasing

According to Valve, "DRM leasing is the process which allows SteamVR to take control of your VR headset's display in order to present low-latency VR content".

Wayland breaks In-home Streaming

Wayland breaks NetWM

Extended Window Manager Hints, a.k.a. NetWM, is an X Window System standard for the communication between window managers and applications

Wayland breaks window icons

Update 6/2024: Looks like this will get unbroken thanks to xdg_toplevel_icon_manager_v1, so that QWindow::setIcon will work again. If, and that's a big if, all compositors will support it. At least KDE is on it.

Wayland breaks drag and drop

Wayland breaks ./windowmanager --replace

  • Many window managers have a --replace argument, but Wayland compositors break this convention.

Wayland breaks Xpra

Xpra is an open-source multi-platform persistent remote display server and client for forwarding applications and desktop screens.

  • Under Xpra a context menu cannot be used: it opens and closes automatically before you can even move the mouse on it. "It's not just GDK, it's the Wayland itself. They decided to break existing applications and expect them to change how they work." (Xpra-org/xpra#4246) ❌ broken since 2024-06-01

Xwayland breaks window resizing

Workarounds

  • Users: Refuse to use Wayland sessions. Uninstall desktop environments/Linux distributions that only ship Wayland sessions. Avoid Wayland-only applications (such as PreSonus Studio One) (potential workaround: run in https://github.com/cage-kiosk/cage)
  • Application developers: Enforce running applications on X11/XWayland (like LibrePCB does as of 11/2023)

Examples of Wayland being forced on users

This is exactly the kind of behavior this gist seeks to prevent.

History

  • 2008: Wayland was started by krh (while at Red Hat)
  • End of 2012: Wayland 1.0
  • Early 2013: GNOME begins Wayland porting

Source: "Where's Wayland?" by Matthias Clasen - Flock 2014

A decade later... Red Hat wants to force Wayland upon everyone, removing support for Xorg

References

@lukefromdc
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lukefromdc commented Feb 18, 2025 via email

@Consolatis
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and the only time I have laggy video is while wdisplays (wlr-randr frontend) is still open.

That is because by default wdisplays records all outputs, there is a "Show Screen Contents" toggle in its menu.

@howdev
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howdev commented Mar 11, 2025

There is no argument, Wayland is still in a very bad state, up to now. I don't understand distribution such as Ubuntu and Fedora has put wayland as default. It is not even production quality !

People was complaining about Nvidia not supporting wayland. Evidently there is a reason for it. and is proven now. Even Nvidia driver supports, most of the apps don't work anyway. Not just any app. Important apps don't work.

Wayland may be a good option for basic use. If you only use default apps from Gnome in these distribution, that is fine of course. If you don't use fractional scaling, that is also fine, you avoided some of the wayland issues.

There are still many major issues, in the majority use cases.
There are many use case, that are outside of default apps. I tried using wayland several times, during its improvement, all fails.
App center may not offer working apps under wayland.
Chromium based browser, can't input Asian language.
Kdeconnect does not work.
Blurry X11 apps from fractional scaling. eg steam, important app for gamers.
X11 memory leak under wayland, eg audacity, that is an important app for musicians.
X11 apps window content does not update, eg musescore

All the major apps does not work.

Most important of all. Xwayland compatibility layer, is not compatible with X11 apps. At least Xwayland should be working properly, for people to use Wayland desktop.

Do users have to think which app work or not, and to tweak it? Just use Xorg.

@ydrojd
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ydrojd commented Mar 13, 2025

It's 2025 and Wayland is still unusable https://www.reddit.com/r/kde/comments/1igzpug/i_tried_to_switch_to_wayland_but_failed/

Its usable if you don't do anything with your computer other then developing wayland

@probonopd
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@ydrojd you are posting this literally directly as a reply to an article that lists concrete points why it is still unusable, e.g., not having a working global menu bar for Gtk apps that are not running under Xwayland. That alone would make it unusable for me.

@FlorianHeigl
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@lukefromdc multihead advantages and hidpi modes are the one thing that matters reasonably, yes.
of course you lose things like a multiseat workstation, and even the login manager doesn't work properly.
like, every second day ubuntu decides to only show the login on the (disabled!) vga output of my workstation board, but NOT on the radeon pro with the active screen, the one i'm using all the time and was using last time till i locked the screen.
i had reasons to go with this setup, and i don't remember them (something with gtk font sizes on 24"@4k), but instead i am remembered DAILY how bad this choice was otherwise.
HW Accell on terminal windows is even worse than in X11, i have no idea why - that leaves me with the strong feeling that if all the energy that went into building a faux alternative and kicking down on X11 would have been invested there (on the stuff like font sharpness etc) we'd be doing quite well with all the bonus features.

@FlorianHeigl
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An issue that has cost me lots of time (till going to KASM as an over the top solution)
Wayland RDP activation from remote is extremely fragile / doesn't work at all, because they mix its session management into other pieces. It'll make you unhappy if you look.

And performance wise it'll not really outrun a 100bt Xterminal from y2k era :(

@Sivecano
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I've been using wayland for multiple years straight now on multiple (rolling-release) distros.
I've used it for gaming on a pure nvidia machine. I have not had any wayland specific issue.
How long are you guys gonna keep finding some hyper-specific niche thing that's not quite the same and thus clearly broken.
Even gnome is sorta getting their shit together a bit more.

But hey; who am I to tell you to stop getting mad it?

@ydrojd
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ydrojd commented Mar 14, 2025

@ydrojd you are posting this literally directly as a reply to an article that lists concrete points why it is still unusable, e.g., not having a working global menu bar for Gtk apps that are not running under Xwayland. That alone would make it unusable for me.

I agree that it is generally unusable (for a lot of people).

@snippins
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snippins commented Mar 29, 2025 •
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@Espionage724 I think the push to Wayland now is based on hope that by having the big distros switched to Wayland, it would push Wayland compositors to the finish line somehow. The Wayland sunk-cost fallacy is real.

Let's imagine if there was no Wayland compositor yesterday, with no weird push for it anywhere and now the suddenly today we have the Gnome Wayland compositor in its current state. I bet people would see it as an good alpha project but are not ready to be used yet.

I feel for many Wayland compositors developers though. Many of them are competent, however the protocol they're developing for, is clearly not.

The state of many people now: really want to adopt new tech, to be ready for the future. However, such tech is still at the alpha stage but somehow are being pretend by a whole bunch of people as being ready. F*ing big distros pushing for alpha software it's so crazy.

If Wayland is as great as promised, my tinkering nature would make a setup for it 5 years ago.

I'm really worry for a future that I have to endured Wayland, instead of enjoying using my computer.

@probonopd
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So far, Wayland does not allow applications to set the position of their windows on the screen. Bummer!

This protocol would change that, at least for privileged applications: ext-toplevel-placement-v1

What do you think about it?

@alerikaisattera
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So far, Wayland does not allow applications to set the position of their windows on the screen

Why are you so obsessed with applications setting the position of their windows? This should not be a feature of the display server protocol. It's the job of window manager

@probonopd
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probonopd commented Mar 30, 2025 •
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No. My spatial file manager needs to store this in a location of its own choosing (e.g., in a file in the directory that is represented by a folder's window). This is central so that the window state travels inside the directory in the filesystem.

Having the compositor store the persistent state would make it impossible for the client application to achieve non-interactive initial placement at specific coordinates, and to store the persistent state in application-specific formats and locations.

@alerikaisattera
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If you are so obsessed with this feature, Arcan seems to allow this in some way. According to the main Arcan developer

It’s nuanced - viewport events lets a client define anchoring in some coordinate space using a reference token. This is used for embedding one window inside another. If there is no token, it is up to the WM to decide what to do with that.

@myownfriend
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So far, Wayland does not allow applications to set the position of their windows on the screen

Why are you so obsessed with applications setting the position of their windows? This should not be a feature of the display server protocol. It's the job of window manager

Because he wants to make a desktop environment that doesn't actually define a shell, it's just a few applications that are pinning themselves to the certain areas of the screen. Is that a good idea? No, but that's the only way he can conceive of doing it.

@probonopd
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probonopd commented Mar 31, 2025 •
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myownfriend, what do you mean by "define a shell"? All I want to write is a spatial file manager. I already have it running as intended on X11 and on Windows(!), both of which have no issues using the move() method on a QMainWindow. What I definitely don't want to have any stakes in is a compositor.

@howdev
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howdev commented Mar 31, 2025

haha why Threads always sidetracked to another subject. Wayland becomes file managers.

Spatial File manager were used by big companies long ago, Apple and Microsoft. There is a good reason, they were abandoned. Spatial File manager causes clutter, confusion, and lot of popup windows.
The best option is use Miller Columns, it was used in the 80s by WindowMaker or GNUstep. To browse folders with many files, miller column allow you to see more files without scrolling, can easily see the previous path and its files. Miller columns still in use by current MacOS

@lukefromdc
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lukefromdc commented Mar 31, 2025 •
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Note that caja can be used as a spatial file manager right now using the 1.28 releases or git master. This works in both x11 and in wayland, so we already have a wayland compatable spatial file manager.

In Preferences->Behavior, select "Open each folder in it's own window" and it becomes a spatial file manager. Deselect it and caja reverts to a browser mode file manager, its default.

The desktop is always a spatial window, this was probably the easy way to ensure the desktop itself always shows its own contents and clicking on any folder opens a new window in either spatial or browser mode, user's choice.

EDIT: note that in wayland, closing and reopening Caja does not restore window positions. They stay where you put them in any one session but this cannot be made persistant in wayland and is not persistant in x11 unless session saving in a MATE session is in use. The geometry of the last window closed IS saved in both cases, just not its position

@probonopd
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probonopd commented Apr 1, 2025 •
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So it misses the mark... a proper spatial file manager ought to save window size, position, and how the stuff inside the window is arranged, and persist it in a way that also works on external drives, CD-ROMs, etc. - so no saving to ~.

@lukefromdc
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Anyway, that's not my problem, we're not even getting feature requests in MATE to work on that, and I myself have difficulty working in environments I am not used to even down to the theme. The fact that that does NOT make wayland unusable for me ought to say something about wayland though.

@useranon350
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@davidaamesjr a current X maintainer metux said that the whole "X was far too BROKEN" is not really true. He demonstrates that every wayland promised "superior" features can be implemented in X. It's just that the devs wanted to works on something new, however after all these years, the sunk-cost fallacy is just too great to turn back now.

It's a little more nuanced. X used to have a bunch of display/device driver code in it which was a complete PITA to work with. Wayland moved all the driver code into one common library, at the cost of not working with Nvidia drivers since they didn't use the new common interface and there were both legal and technical disputes over making them match. However, X11 was patched to use the same driver backend as Wayland years ago and all the legacy drivers are being removed, so the X11 maintainer is probably correct that there is no real advantage to Wayland now.

Wayland could still have value if the devs could get their heads out of their asses and add constructive, secure features to the protocol instead of bike-shedding for a decade and leaving every desktop environment to use their own extensions. It's literally worse than the X11 extensions which they used as justification for making Wayland in the first place.

@useranon350
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So far, Wayland does not allow applications to set the position of their windows on the screen

Why are you so obsessed with applications setting the position of their windows? This should not be a feature of the display server protocol. It's the job of window manager

Because he wants to make a desktop environment that doesn't actually define a shell, it's just a few applications that are pinning themselves to the certain areas of the screen. Is that a good idea? No, but that's the only way he can conceive of doing it.

Yes, I'll just ask the software vendors to write a plugin for every single desktop environment known to man to do the window management for their application correctly rather than just handling it in the app like on every other desktop OS. If your windowing system is less functional than Windows 98, that is not a user or application developer problem. GNOME devs are just salty that their new "shell" abstraction got some negative feedback and rather than address the problems they're claiming anything that doesn't work well with their abstraction is a "bad idea" or "insecure".

@davidaamesjr
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This has been a really great source of information, I have changed my mind and I am switching back to X11. Applause Actually just kidding, I'm just turning the notifications for this post off. If you're not contributing code to wayland and you still hate it and just want to make hate threads all day that's up to you! If you really are being FORCED to use it, I'm sorry that someone has that much control over you or how you do your job that they require you to do something you don't wanna do. I recommend peace talks between X11 and Wayland users, or just don't worry so much about it? TTYL

@useranon350
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This has been a really great source of information, I have changed my mind and I am switching back to X11. Applause Actually just kidding, I'm just turning the notifications for this post off. If you're not contributing code to wayland and you still hate it and just want to make hate threads all day that's up to you! If you really are being FORCED to use it, I'm sorry that someone has that much control over you or how you do your job that they require you to do something you don't wanna do. I recommend peace talks between X11 and Wayland users, or just don't worry so much about it? TTYL

For personal use, I'm just going to use Arcan whenever X.Org stops working or it hits 1.0. Whenever RHEL10 ships, a ton of people (probably including me) will be forced to use it for work. It will be even more of a pain in the ass for the millions of people who have to use enterprise or professional software which uses many niche features and absolutely won't be rewritten just to satisfy the Wayland devs. We'll just be forced to run the software on Windows. Many people will be fed up and just use Windows+WSL2 for everything. (I have already seen this happen because of minor features being removed from RHEL, and the features Wayland breaks are not minor.)

Ultimately, if the Wayland devs want to drive their shiny new ship into a iceberg, that's up to them. I'm still going to call a spade a space though.

@davidaamesjr
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davidaamesjr commented Apr 13, 2025 via email

@probonopd
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As of 4/2025, Perplexity summarizes the situation like this:

Wayland's architecture introduces protocol-driven limitations and ecosystem fragmentation that create gaps compared to Windows and macOS. Key missing features include:

1. Advanced Window Management

  • Global window positioning: Applications cannot programmatically set window positions (e.g., for custom layouts or pop-ups like Firefox’s picture-in-picture)[10].
  • Drag-and-drop interoperability: No seamless data transfer between XWayland and native Wayland windows[1][9].

2. Automation and Accessibility

  • UI automation/testing: Lack of standardized protocols for screen readers, GUI scripting (e.g., Peek), or accessibility tools[4][10].
  • Global input capture: Applications cannot intercept input without focus (e.g., for hotkeys or macros)[2][5].

3. Hardware Integration

  • Mixed refresh rate handling: Inconsistent support across compositors for VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) in multi-monitor setups[5][8].
  • NVIDIA GPU quirks: Partial driver support causes performance/compatibility issues[5][6].
  • Wacom tablet support: Limited pressure sensitivity/configuration in art workflows[5].

4. Specialized Features

  • Screen color adjustment: Tools like VibrantLinux lack Wayland equivalents for color calibration[6].
  • Mouse customization: No native alternative to X11 utilities like imwheel for adjusting scroll sensitivity[6].

5. Security-Driven Limitations

  • Clipboard/input isolation: Third-party apps cannot access shared clipboards or input events without explicit permissions[2][10].
  • Screensharing fragmentation: Relies on multiple IPC protocols (Wayland, Pipewire, dbus) instead of a unified solution[1][10].

6. Application Compatibility

  • Electron apps: Many default to XWayland, causing blurry fractional scaling[8].
  • Gaming: Some titles crash or lack features like OBS Twitch integration on Wayland[5][8].

Design Philosophy Constraints
Unlike Windows/macOS, Wayland enforces strict client isolation and delegates advanced features to compositor-specific protocols (e.g., KDE’s KWin vs. GNOME’s Mutter). This decentralization leads to inconsistent adoption of standards like session restore[5] or global shortcuts[5][10]. While X11 allowed "hacky" solutions for niche workflows, Wayland’s security-first model intentionally blocks such approaches, prioritizing maintainability over backward compatibility[4][9].

Citations:
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/18s0ce2/does_wayland_really_break_everything_nate_graham/
[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions/comments/p9utr4/why_is_wayland_a_big_deal/
[3] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/1h10304/whats_the_point_of_wayland_when_pretty_much_all/
[4] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/qid50x/does_anyone_else_feel_that_wayland_is_taking_away/
[5] https://www.reddit.com/r/kde/comments/16lophi/so_lets_talk_about_this_wayland_thing/
[6] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/1dl833i/the_wayland_breaks_everything_gist_still_has/
[7] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/fbxxu6/advantages_of_wayland_over_xorg/
[8] https://www.reddit.com/r/Fedora/comments/vhcoiu/what_windowsmacos_features_and_applications_youre/
[9] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/1976pqc/why_doesnt_windows_have_the_x11_vs_wayland_issue/
[10] https://blog.tenstral.net/2024/01/wayland-really-breaks-things-just-for-now.html
[11] https://gist.github.com/probonopd/9feb7c20257af5dd915e3a9f2d1f2277
[12] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29017563
[13] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlvusAuDDZ0
[14] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38508311
[15] https://www.osnews.com/story/138565/the-state-of-x-org-and-wayland-in-one-paragraph/
[16] https://pointieststick.com/2023/09/17/so-lets-talk-about-this-wayland-thing/

Answer from Perplexity: https://www.perplexity.ai/search/why-is-wayland-still-not-featu-S4QHxPuoQkK_u_.Ir5t9tA?utm_source=copy_output

@Sivecano
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finally we've arrived at AI slop

@dm17
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dm17 commented Apr 15, 2025 •
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As of 4/2025, Perplexity summarizes the situation like this

Haha... And I asked Perplexity to take systemd into account

The combination of systemd and Wayland could potentially limit the flexibility and control of traditional Linux systems due to their design philosophies and technical implementations. Here’s how and why:

Systemd's Role in Centralization

  1. Unified Control: Systemd centralizes many system management tasks, such as service management, logging, and session tracking. This centralization can reduce user control over individual components, as systemd replaces modular tools with a monolithic framework. For example, features like socket activation and session tracking integrate deeply into systemd, making it harder to use alternative tools or configurations[3].
  2. Dependency Lock-in: Many Linux distributions now rely heavily on systemd, making it difficult for users to opt out or replace it with alternative init systems without significant effort[3].

Wayland's Restrictive Design

  1. Security Over Flexibility: Wayland prioritizes security by design, limiting features like root access for GUI applications and global hotkeys. While this enhances security, it restricts administrative flexibility and certain workflows that were possible under X11[5].
  2. Client-Side Decorations: Wayland shifts window decorations to the application level (client-side), reducing the uniformity and control that traditional window managers provided[5].
  3. Compatibility Challenges: Wayland breaks compatibility with many older applications and tools that rely on X11 features. Xwayland provides a compatibility layer but adds complexity and may not support all legacy functionalities[3][5].

Combined Impact

  1. Integration with Systemd: Wayland’s reliance on systemd-specific libraries for features like session tracking further ties the display server to systemd’s centralized model[3]. This integration makes it harder to decouple these components for users seeking more modular setups.
  2. Containerization via Systemd-nspawn: Combining Wayland with systemd-nspawn enables isolated desktop environments but also abstracts hardware access, potentially limiting direct user control over the host system[1].

Potential Lockdown Similar to Android

While Android's lockdown primarily stems from proprietary vendor modifications and app ecosystem restrictions, the systemd-Wayland combination could lead to a similar scenario in desktop Linux due to:

  • Reduced modularity and increased reliance on centralized frameworks.
  • Restricted administrative capabilities in favor of predefined workflows.
  • Compatibility barriers that discourage alternative configurations.

This shift might not be intentional but could emerge as a byproduct of prioritizing security, modernity, and ease of use over traditional flexibility.

Citations:
[1] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/43286518/how-to-set-up-nested-wayland-desktop-environment-with-systemd-nspawn-container
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0zj8hNJ50c
[3] https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Xwayland
[4] https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/wayland-in-linux-development-programming/
[5] https://www.kali.org/docs/general-use/wayland/
[6] https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/eww-tray-wayland-git

Answer from Perplexity: https://www.perplexity.ai/search/based-on-the-state-of-wayland-mqkNRRVKRDas6QRV3uM2uQ?utm_source=copy_output

@danielg4
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finally we've arrived at AI slop

Evidently, "AI slop" is the new Godwin's Law.

@howdev
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howdev commented Apr 15, 2025

This has been a really great source of information, I have changed my mind and I am switching back to X11. Applause Actually just kidding, I'm just turning the notifications for this post off. If you're not contributing code to wayland and you still hate it and just want to make hate threads all day that's up to you! If you really are being FORCED to use it, I'm sorry that someone has that much control over you or how you do your job that they require you to do something you don't wanna do. I recommend peace talks between X11 and Wayland users, or just don't worry so much about it? TTYL

Haha ??? If I could contribute code, why contribute to wayland? Wayland developers already thinks X11 apps should just work in Xwayland, and we should fix our x11 apps which don't need fixing.
Many apps don't work, Wayland still being default, already try force you to use it. If they remove Xorg, you are forced permanently, that is possible.
Wayland started 16 years ago ! If X11 developers think Wayland has good potential, X11 apps would have been moved over long ago, and there would be accelerated development, with huge contributions. You will not need to wait 16 years with apps not working. X11 apps development being reluctant to move to Wayland, already shows X11 is still better.

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