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The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

phoronix.com

121–130 of 714 posts

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#121
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep trying to use Wayland, but it never fully works. Everyone keeps saying how well the highdpi stuff works, but then it really only works for a subset of things. For the rest it's actually worse than Xorg. Multiscreen is Xorg is kinda mushy so I thought maybe Wayland fixes it, but no it doesn't. Wayland is now 12 years old and everything is still half-baked. It quotes an intel developer saying they don't want to…

Having used Intel open source drivers for 12 years, I've never lost the opinion I gained back with X3100 gpu that Intel is the darling because technically open sourcing the driver papered over the many, many faults of their code. Whenever I had a chance to run on nvidia binary drivers, the only things I occasionally missed were some new features, or having to wait a bit longer to update the kernel. Stability was bett…

> Whenever I had a chance to run on nvidia binary drivers, the only things I occasionally missed were some new features, or having to wait a bit longer to update the kernel. Stability was better, drivers more performant, and I don't remember daily fighting with memory leaks.

I had a Nvidia Riva TNT2 and later on an Nvidia GeForce. I ran Linux on it.

I had stability issues with the driver, but I solved it the following way: ran one X server with a DE, and another X server with Nvidia's proprietary driver (mostly for games). This way, if I had to kill the X server using Nvidia's driver I didn't lose any work.

If that wasn't enough, all the bloody time there were massive security problems found in Nvidia's proprietary driver. I don't know if that is still the case, cause I switched away to ATi in the 00s, and Intel graphics cards + ThinkPad as laptop. ATi/AMD has come a long way ever since. Their FOSS drivers are stable, and they deliver (see various Phoronix benchmarks).

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#122

Microsoft should contribute their Windows compositing engine (Desktop Window Manager or Desktop Compositing Engine) to Linux and we can move one.

The fact that the Windows desktop works reliably with basically zero issues and the Linux desktop is a complete mess is quite a compelling reason to use Windows surely? I can't see Microsoft giving away that advantage, even if it were technically possible, which it probably isn't.

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#123
One important point to note in these discussions is that X.Org is a specific implementation of the X11 protocol (the canonical implementation as it happens).

Wayland is the protocol and compared to X11 in this context. There are multiple implementations including:

1) Weston (the reference implementation)

2) Mutter (Gnome)

3) Kwin (KDE, also implements X11)

It's important to draw the distinction as many/most of the limitations people come across are in the implementation not with the protocol. People using different implementations will come across different issues too.

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wayland is really slow. I don't know if it's the compositing or what but it's unusable on lighter hardware that X ran fine on. This is crazy when you think about it. I remember running an X server, Hummingbird I think it was called, on 386 and 486 machines connecting to Suns and it was fine , this was a perfectly acceptable way to work. Couple of xterms, an Emacs, xbiff for email, maybe some xeyes just for fun. Devel…

What could be the reason behind this? Asking as a noob.

When a window bar needs a gradient, you are starting to stress the graphics engine... And that is just a simple bitmap (or not)...

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#125
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your problem with NetworkManager? It's generally good, and certainly much better than what came before.

I just spent an hour trying to get it to connect to a VPN via a shell script with no success sudo nmcli conn up id "VPN" --ask Works great but there is no sign of --password --user-name Instead I have to write my configuration to a file and read from the that file. Even then I couldn't get it working. Also `--ask` doesn't ask for your user name. I mean, sure, it's probably fine when you know how to use it but it has…

just yesterday i set up a vpn client very easily by running

    nmcli connection import type openvpn file myconfig.vpn
the only issue that i had was SELinux doing its job, and was quickly fixed.

Even easier than with the usual gui tools.

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#127
post #102
post #57

I have been using sway on Fedora for a year. It's been really good so. It's a smaller niche than X.org's, but I get to do everything I need. HiDPI support is just right, just throw output eDP1-1 scale 2 in the config and you're set. Clipboard works perfectly splendid, screen-sharing works (not as perfectly splendid as clipboard does), input works, chromium/electron is getting support for native wayland. Qt and GTK Wa…

Just out of curiosity, how does screenshare work for you? I've been trying setting it up for work (slack/teams), but to this day it just doesn't work. Using debian sid, so pretty up-to date packages tbh. I just start new xorg session for screenshare, which, frankly, sucks.

Well, it works on FF and certain builds of chromium (those built with ENABLE_PIPEWIRE flag on). I am using xdg-desktop-portal-wlr and it works quite good. I was able to present my desktop to others without significant hiccups. Once Electron enables Ozone (and builds with PIPEWIRE on) we will be able to use screen sharing also on teams and other electron-packaged apps. This obviously works for my workflow and I understand it won't work for everyone. I don't know about Zoom, but I heard (and thus not entirely sure) it works only on specific distros with some specific GNOME versions.

EDIT. I misread Slack for Zoom.

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#128

Yes, I agree. X11 is a historic artifact that is supposed to be honored in the museum now. The C/S architecture of X11 hits the spot when terminals and thin client are the norm, that means 20-30 years ago, but today, we all have dedicated graphics display devices (GPU, monitors) even in our pocket smartphone, and the way X11 works is holding Linux desktop scene back. But without X11 there you can't show how much impr…

> The C/S architecture of X11 hits the spot when terminals and thin client are the norm, that means 20-30 years ago, but today, we all have dedicated graphics display devices (GPU, monitors) even in our pocket smartphone, and the way X11 works is holding Linux desktop scene back. I used X11 forwarding just yesterday to open & control my linux desktop's music player from my mac - which other 2020 technology allows me…

good luck doing that with wayland

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#129
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do need some form of signal that indicates a project has a maintainer though. It doesn’t matter that he has been inactive for 4 years (on that project), but if I submit a PR, it’s nice if there’s someone at the end of the line.

Repos could really have exactly that. A dead man's switch that asks you every, I don't know, three.to six months - via email even - "you good for this repo still?". You answer with a click "yup" and that's it - a signal on a repo on github or whatever that says "still alive". Otherwise "uh oh - we need help" and then a mechanism there to immediately offer alternative forks with a good enough signal "strength". It's l…

You wouldn’t even necessarily need git/github to implement a new system! Agree on a standard file name like .githeartbeat containing a timestamp. Every few months (or w/e), active maintainers could push a commit to update the timestamp.

Re: The X.Org Server Is Abandonware?

#130
I wonder why we don’t see anything out of China for x.org ? They want to be self reliant in hardware, why not start with software ? Then I wonder if the us government will come around and ban open-source like they want to ban encryption in the name of protecting the economy... not that I want the last thing to happen of course.
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