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Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

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Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#41

Post by pmontra »

metadat wrote: post #6

Is it better than xrdp though? I found xrdp last week and it's stellar, basically a microsoft-compatible RDP server for Linux. It's a complete solution, no drama and simply amazing. Every other Linux remote desktop solution I tried was a mess, including Xpra (which was quite involved to even get installed and Debian, and then a letdown, yikes). I wonder what happens with Wprs when you try to launch virt-manager, whic…

I use remmina for that. It's simpler to configure. For example, it can export a local Linux directory to a Windows machine as a network share without messing with command line options. Not that CLI is bad, far from me, but it saves the time to learn the options for xrdp.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#42

Post by IshKebab »

epcoa wrote: post #40
billpg wrote: post #18

"We've built X. It allows you to run graphical applications over a network." "Here's an optimization for when the X display is the same machine as the process." "We've built Wayland. We all run applications on the same machine as the display and X gets in the way." "We'd like to run applications from machines over the internet." "We've built Wprs. It allows you to run graphical applications over a network." That's th…

There are two seemingly irreconcilable camps at this point as to whether X itself is fundamentally sound technology for remote display or any kind of display technology going into the future. There are many reasons hashed out to death about this. Yes you could continue to add new X extensions, and the second system effect is a real consideration, but neither of those are absolute arguments against starting fresh with…

> There are two seemingly irreconcilable camps at this point as to whether X itself is fundamentally sound technology for remote display or any kind of display technology going into the future.

Are there? I don't think anyone seriously thinks X is the way forward do they? They just don't like some of Wayland's poor choices, which I think is fair.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#43

Post by immibis »

IshKebab wrote: post #42
epcoa wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two seemingly irreconcilable camps at this point as to whether X itself is fundamentally sound technology for remote display or any kind of display technology going into the future. There are many reasons hashed out to death about this. Yes you could continue to add new X extensions, and the second system effect is a real consideration, but neither of those are absolute arguments against starting fresh with…

> There are two seemingly irreconcilable camps at this point as to whether X itself is fundamentally sound technology for remote display or any kind of display technology going into the future. Are there? I don't think anyone seriously thinks X is the way forward do they? They just don't like some of Wayland's poor choices, which I think is fair.

As someone who actually researched X I don't really see the problems with it. Xorg has some, but the X11 protocol seems to have fewer problems than the Wayland protocol.

For instance it already supports mixing windows with different colour modes, which can be used for HDR.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#44

Post by epcoa »

immibis wrote: post #43
IshKebab wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There are two seemingly irreconcilable camps at this point as to whether X itself is fundamentally sound technology for remote display or any kind of display technology going into the future. Are there? I don't think anyone seriously thinks X is the way forward do they? They just don't like some of Wayland's poor choices, which I think is fair.

As someone who actually researched X I don't really see the problems with it. Xorg has some, but the X11 protocol seems to have fewer problems than the Wayland protocol. For instance it already supports mixing windows with different colour modes, which can be used for HDR.

X11 the base protocol is wholly unsuited to the needs of modern display systems, full stop. Moreover, the base security profile is also completely outdated. Now you can always extend the protocol, and continue to use the myriad extensions over the years like XRENDER, DBE, DnD, etc, etc (or paper over deficiencies with contraptions like NX/x2go and Xpra). The question is what useful benefit is being provided by that miniscule still relevant base that justifies its existence along with the other legacy cruft and baggage.

"X11 seems to have fewer problems than the Wayland protocol" is too vague to be cogent so I will not address it. But the argument is more than just X11 vs Wayland, as Wayland isn't the only alternative display system nor is it the only answer to network transparent remote display technology either. "Wayland sucks" really is not a valid response to "X I don't really see the problems with it."

True, X11 the wire protocol isn't the most horrible thing in a world where SOAP exists, but in practice the latency story is overall bad. Yes you can pipeline with xcb and not with Xlib, so a few of the rehashed latency issues by the peanut gallery are false attribution, but the core protocol still makes many basic operations inherently synchronous and strictly ordered, many just a consequence of how the X server manages state. There are fundamental architectural issues.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#45

Post by nicolasavru »

dsp_person wrote: post #5

Can this be used to switch back and forth between different computers? If I remember correct Xpra supports this. E.g. (1) open a session on desktop with firefox, thunderbird, vscode. (2) Then grab laptop and go to a coffee shop, connect with wayland-tranpositor to the desktop to resume the session with those programs where you left off with them. (3) Then go home and resume from the desktop. I guess for (1) and (3) y…

Yes. A wprs session is persistent on the server (currently a single session per user, we're going to support multiple sessions for a user when we get to it), so you can connect/reconnect from different client computers.

If you start the application in a local wprsc connecting to a local wprsd instead of in the local compositor directly, you can later connect to the session with a remote wprsc.

Locking the screen (the other subthread in here) is not applicable to this, applications are drawn wherever the wprsc is running and only one wprsc can be connected at a time.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#46

Post by shmerl »

prmoustache wrote: post #16
shmerl wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think freerdp is a better option since it has integration with Wayland and even some Wayland DEs are adopting it as remote access feature.

From what I understand freerdp is only the client component while xrdp is the server component.

I think freerdp has both client and server implementation.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#47

Post by nicolasavru »

hongspike wrote: post #25

Cool project. Maybe a dumb question but what rendering method does Wprs use?

wprs doesn't do its own rendering, it passes through already-drawn image buffers from applications on the server side to the local compositor on the client side, which then composits/renders them however it wishes to.

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#48

Post by nicolasavru »

Shish2k wrote: post #28

Is there any open-source remote desktop that forwards the full desktop experience (not just pixels, but also audio, input devices beyond keyboard & mouse, with high refresh rates and low latency)?

wprs: * does audio by forwarding a pulseaudio/pipewire socket, but it doesn't work so well for remote networks. I'd like to do something better in the future. * defaults to 60fps and can support significantly higher refresh rates, depend on your cpu and bandwidth. * aims to be low latency but prioritizes quality and so requires a good cpu and network connection to be low latency * should be able to handle (possibly with some additional code) any input devices wayland supports

Re: Wprs – rootless remote desktop for Wayland (and X11, via XWayland) applications

#50

Post by philsnow »

pxc wrote: post #11
metadat wrote: post #6

Is it better than xrdp though? I found xrdp last week and it's stellar, basically a microsoft-compatible RDP server for Linux. It's a complete solution, no drama and simply amazing. Every other Linux remote desktop solution I tried was a mess, including Xpra (which was quite involved to even get installed and Debian, and then a letdown, yikes). I wonder what happens with Wprs when you try to launch virt-manager, whic…

For me, definitely yes, because it's rootless. Being able to stream individual windows is an absolutely killer feature. Having to deal with non-native window management is a nightmare, not to mention that it leaves you pulling down more pixels than you need to. Microsoft has similar functionality but it's gated behind enterprise licenses. I ran Xpra for free when I was a kid and it was magical; many years later I've…

Rootless is a good UX especially if you use a tiling window manager locally, because of the cognitive dissonance when one of your tiled windows is a remote fvwm desktop or similar.

Likewise, I think the overwhelming majority of tiling window managers are very keyboard-oriented, so if you use the same or a similar one on a remote rooted vnc session, there will be conflicts between local and remote keybindings unless you're really careful about it. Better to just let the local WM manage everything.

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