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Thanks for the link — Phoenix is a great project, and it clearly shows that a clean, modern X11 implementation still resonates with many developers. What I’m t
by powerwordtree 10mo ago
Thanks for the link — Phoenix is a great project, and it clearly shows that a clean,
modern X11 implementation still resonates with many developers.
What I’m talking about is something different. My post is not about building an
implementation myself, but about advocating for a direction. The idea is not to keep
Xorg’s implementation or its internal abstraction layer, but to preserve the design
philosophy of X itself — the distributed, protocol‑based, client/server model that
enables remote graphics, composability, and implementation diversity.
A key advantage of following the X philosophy is that we don’t need to change GPU
drivers, because modern Linux already has Mesa/KMS/DRM as the real driver layer. A new
protocol and a lightweight, strictly‑scoped abstraction layer could sit above that,
combining X’s distributed design with modern techniques from Mesa, without inheriting
X11’s legacy complexity. This layer would not implement any concrete rendering or window
system logic — only provide the minimal interface needed for distributed graphics and
multiple implementations to coexist.
This avoids the “Android-style” direction where the graphics stack becomes local-only and
loses distributed capabilities. Instead, it keeps the door open for a healthier,
multi‑implementation ecosystem.
(English is not my native language, so this reply is translated with AI.)
- wmf 10mo agothe distributed, protocol‑based, client/server model that enables remote graphics, composability, and implementation diversity This mostly sounds like Wayland to me. Anyway, build it.