3 ms·

just based off release notes arcan always felt like a much more compelling display project than wayland. wayland: if we move the compositor into the kernel we

by somat 4y ago

just based off release notes arcan always felt like a much more compelling display project than wayland. wayland: if we move the compositor into the kernel we can solve several performance problems. arcan: if we make a universal transport layer we can solve most topological problems. Plus I like arcan because it reads like it is one guy, deciding the world needed a better display server. and just keeps at it, day to day, no team, no consensus, just getting it done. however disclamer: I made a port of arcan to openbsd and could never quite figure out what to do with it. the curse of a display server with not enough software I guess.

chalst 4y ago
> disclamer: I made a port of arcan to openbsd and could never quite figure out what to do with it. the curse of a display server with not enough software I guess. Port stuff to it? Out of curiosity, did you base the OpenBSD port on the NetBSD port?
- somat 4y ago
  I never published it due to bugs, so shame on me but it was a fresh port just from the sources, the author has a post I enjoyed where he explains some of the differences between how linux and openbsd do things, I sort of took this as a sign that the author at least tried it on openbsd and sure enough it built without too much trouble. https://arcan-fe.com/2018/04/25/towards-secure-system-graphics-arcan-and-openbsd/ https://arcan-fe.com/2018/04/25/towards-secure-system-graphi... https://nl1.outband.net/fossil/ports/file?name=graphics/arcan/Makefile&ci=tip https://nl1.outband.net/fossil/ports/file?name=graphics/arca...
pengaru 4y ago
> wayland: if we move the compositor into the kernel we can solve several performance problems. Where exactly does Wayland introduce a kernel-based compositor? Existing Wayland implementations just consolidate what was often several userspace processes in the composited X11 model into a single monolithic userspace process responsible for the window management, input multiplexing/routing, and compositing. I'm not certain this is even a strictly specified aspect of Wayland either, it may just be convenient and simpler to implement this way while enjoying some natural performance advantages. There's no kernel Wayland compositors AFAIK. Perhaps you're conflating KMS with Wayland since they kind of overlapped chronologically? KMS enabled running XOrg without requiring root using the modesetting driver, it's been a huge step towards cleaning up the graphics stack on Linux, independent of Wayland.
- somat 4y ago
  You are correct of course. as an openbsd user it turns out I don't actually know that much about the actual advantages of wayland. I tend to look at it from the rather myopic view point of what it is missing rather than what it has
  - exikyut 4y ago
    This is entirely unrelated to the discussion, but something interesting happened to this subchain and I can't just wander past :). I came back to this tab after a few hours to find (at the point I'd come back) that all three posts in this chain were marked as being written "45 minutes ago". All three of them. After having a bit of a memory crisis ("I read this last night... didn't I???") I searched for the text in one of them in Algolia, which found the post and confirmed it had been posted hours earlier. Algolia's now resynced to HN, and shows the same timestamps. Didn't properly investigate at the time. Woops. At least I grabbed a couple of screenshots. https://imgur.com/a/fInenj4 https://imgur.com/a/fInenj4

by somat 4y ago

chalst 4y ago

> disclamer: I made a port of arcan to openbsd and could never quite figure out what to do with it. the curse of a display server with not enough software I guess. Port stuff to it? Out of curiosity, did you base the OpenBSD port on the NetBSD port?

somat 4y ago
I never published it due to bugs, so shame on me but it was a fresh port just from the sources, the author has a post I enjoyed where he explains some of the differences between how linux and openbsd do things, I sort of took this as a sign that the author at least tried it on openbsd and sure enough it built without too much trouble. https://arcan-fe.com/2018/04/25/towards-secure-system-graphics-arcan-and-openbsd/ https://arcan-fe.com/2018/04/25/towards-secure-system-graphi... https://nl1.outband.net/fossil/ports/file?name=graphics/arcan/Makefile&ci=tip https://nl1.outband.net/fossil/ports/file?name=graphics/arca...

pengaru 4y ago

> wayland: if we move the compositor into the kernel we can solve several performance problems. Where exactly does Wayland introduce a kernel-based compositor? Existing Wayland implementations just consolidate what was often several userspace processes in the composited X11 model into a single monolithic userspace process responsible for the window management, input multiplexing/routing, and compositing. I'm not certain this is even a strictly specified aspect of Wayland either, it may just be convenient and simpler to implement this way while enjoying some natural performance advantages. There's no kernel Wayland compositors AFAIK. Perhaps you're conflating KMS with Wayland since they kind of overlapped chronologically? KMS enabled running XOrg without requiring root using the modesetting driver, it's been a huge step towards cleaning up the graphics stack on Linux, independent of Wayland.

somat 4y ago
You are correct of course. as an openbsd user it turns out I don't actually know that much about the actual advantages of wayland. I tend to look at it from the rather myopic view point of what it is missing rather than what it has
- exikyut 4y ago
  This is entirely unrelated to the discussion, but something interesting happened to this subchain and I can't just wander past :). I came back to this tab after a few hours to find (at the point I'd come back) that all three posts in this chain were marked as being written "45 minutes ago". All three of them. After having a bit of a memory crisis ("I read this last night... didn't I???") I searched for the text in one of them in Algolia, which found the post and confirmed it had been posted hours earlier. Algolia's now resynced to HN, and shows the same timestamps. Didn't properly investigate at the time. Woops. At least I grabbed a couple of screenshots. https://imgur.com/a/fInenj4 https://imgur.com/a/fInenj4