X11 Turns 25 Years Old Today

[russofris]

Also it allows for tear-tree video, transparency (yes there are legit cases for transparency...

Vertical sync and transparency are interesting examples as neither of them require a compositor, and had existed prior to compositors for well over a decade. The only truly legitimate cases for transparency are when the display is being represented in three dimensions and/or when the display is itself transparent.

I'm not arguing against compositors, just that the benefits that you describe aren't exclusive to their use and optimal at the composition layer.

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[KellyClowers]

Im ignoring the others because they mostly seem like opinion pieces. THIS one however I did want to point out: There's more to being a compositor than just providing 3D. Being a compositor allows applications / toolkits to leverage the GPU for display, leaving the CPU and RAM to do other things. Also it allows for tear-tree video, transparency (yes there are legit cases for transparency, in the windows world-- desktop peek, or the compositor effect to show all windows side by side and let you select the individual one you want instead of alt-tabbing through them one by one). And i'm sure an actual developer (Martin? if he's reading this thread) could point out technical benefits to compositing as well, but unfortunately I am not a developer.

I do not use Mutter, or Kwin, or Compiz. I do not care about them. I use Awesome, I have used fluxbox and wmii in the past (ok, I did use kwin long ago, but I would not want to now). In the future I may use something else, but it would likely be in the same vein. If I did find a compositor that did something useful for me, I am fine with it being outside the WM thank you very much.

[mark45]

Since on Linux global keyboard hotkeys are only done with Xlib (X11), what's Wayland's way of doing this? Is there a way at all?

[russofris]

Since on Linux global keyboard hotkeys are only done with Xlib (X11), what's Wayland's way of doing this? Is there a way at all?

I saw some hotkey stuff last time I took a look at Wayland. In addition, the WM typically has its own set of hotkeys. "Global" keyboard hotkeys were only global when using X11, which is OK since it was the only real game in town. I don't feel that they were truly "global" either, since VT hotkeys worked perfectly fine without X11 present, and continued working with X running.

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[mark45]

I saw some hotkey stuff last time I took a look at Wayland. In addition, the WM typically has its own set of hotkeys. "Global" keyboard hotkeys were only global when using X11, which is OK since it was the only real game in town. I don't feel that they were truly "global" either, since VT hotkeys worked perfectly fine without X11 present, and continued working with X running.

F

Thanks, but Wayland either has support for it or it doesn't. I didn't notice in the Wayland documentation any API/protocol about global hotkeys, have you? Seeing "some hotkey stuff" could be anything, maybe even a workaround around Wayland's inability to deal with this. I'm interested into someone pointing out the API or so.

I created an app the other day which captures global hotkeys through Xlib and I'm trying to find a way to make it work under Wayland, and since I can't rely on Xlib.. I wonder.

[curaga]

Since on Linux global keyboard hotkeys are only done with Xlib (X11), what's Wayland's way of doing this? Is there a way at all?

I often use actkbd to have "global hotkeys" that work both in X and in the console, without X running.

[F i L]

>But remote access ive never ONCE used. I've always gone for a full desktop via an RDP-like protocol. Just seems like a better solution to me because you do get the full desktop available to you.
I haven't yet happened to use a single app remote connection... I have used the whole desktop over X11/NX. Lately I have not had 2 computers running X...

>Also, isnt X11's remote protocol REALLY inefficient for modern applications?
It has its inefficiencies unfortunately, yes. Thus NX. I wouldn't be opposed to X12 or something that kept the good ideas but made things more efficient.

>As far as the "old, polished WMs" Anyone using Ratpoison / blackbox / openbox / etc, will probably stick to X11 for a long time anyway.
Goddamn right.

>Writing an entire compositor? Kwin, Mutter,and Compiz already ARE their own compositor
I really don't care. They can keep their 3d, I don't want it.

>if they are taking the time TO write their own UI, let them do it.
That's a negative. If I wanted that, I would use Chrome and all those windows apps like RealPlayer that do that. But I don't!

>But as far as apps that have hung / crashed / froze: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archive...ay/001002.html
Meh, whatever, if if that works out, it only solves half the problem.

Your a relic, dude. We must move forward no matter how much old folks like you want to remain in the past for nostalgic reasons.

[Ericg]

--delete--

[mark45]

I often use actkbd to have "global hotkeys" that work both in X and in the console, without X running.

Sorry I thought it's self evident that I only mean solutions that are installed and running by default. One can probably even write a module for the Linux kernel and use that but we're only talking about the stuff installed by default on any (mainstream) Linux distro.

[russofris]

Thanks, but Wayland either has support for it or it doesn't.

I do not think the word "global" means what you think it means.

Allow me to restate. Wayland does not appear to support X11 hotkeys. We shouldn't refer to X11 hotkeys as "global", since they're not really "global". I guess you could say that they're "global" to X11 applications. I fully expect things like Alt-Tab will still work under Wayland, through the Wayland or WM hotkeys.

"Hotkeys" will work just fine without X11, just like they do under NT, OSX, Linux, and any other X11-less stack.

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