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The X API Is About 15 Times Bigger Than Wayland

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  • Silverthorn
    replied
    Simply because Wayland lacks some features compared to X does not in any way imply that it has less features. Instead I would say that Wayland has more features than X due to it having exactly the capabilities which X lacks. The sections of X that will not be implemented in Wayland should be counted as a positive feature of Wayland.
    Last edited by Silverthorn; 17 October 2012, 02:39 PM.

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  • Koorac
    replied
    135 entry points doesn't mean much, what if one of them is like ioctl(2)

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  • Ericg
    replied
    PART of Wayland being smaller is that while yes it has less features, it also has less things it has to support.

    Straight from the Wayland FAQ:


    What is wrong with X?

    The problem with X is that... it's X. When you're an X server there's a tremendous amount of functionality that you must support to claim to speak the X protocol, yet nobody will ever use this. For example, core fonts; this is the original font model that was how your got text on the screen for the many first years of X11. This includes code tables, glyph rasterization and caching, XLFDs (seriously, XLFDs!). Also, the entire core rendering API that lets you draw stippled lines, polygons, wide arcs and many more state-of-the-1980s style graphics primitives. For many things we've been able to keep the X.org server modern by adding extensions such as XRandR, XRender and COMPOSITE and to some extent phase out less useful extensions. But we can't ever get rid of the core rendering API and much other complexity that is rarely used in a modern desktop. With Wayland we can move the X server and all its legacy technology to a optional code path. Getting to a point where the X server is a compatibility option instead of the core rendering system will take a while, but we'll never get there if don't plan for it.

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  • phred14
    replied
    Nor has it encountered the real world, yet. Right now it's a "battle plan", and battle plans seldom survive encounter with the enemy. That's not to say that it's not worthwhile, and can be an improvement over X. It's just that a year or two down the road, Wayland will have its ugly warts and bits of bloat, though it will no doubt still be smaller than X.

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  • halfmanhalfamazing
    replied
    Less functionality = smaller

    This article is a bit misleading.

    There's probably a good argument to be made that Wayland can be(going forward) smaller and leaner than X is including the same features, or even adding in new features. But we aren't there yet.

    Right now, it's simply a matter of Wayland does less, so it's smaller. X does more, so it's bigger.

    How big is Xwayland, anyways?(I would assume it's not very large, but that misses the point) Wayland doesn't have the backward compatibility layer, its X which has the 'forward compatibility' layer, so to say. So by definition, X would have to be bigger.

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  • johnc
    replied
    Of course.

    It supports less functionality.

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  • phoronix
    started a topic The X API Is About 15 Times Bigger Than Wayland

    The X API Is About 15 Times Bigger Than Wayland

    Phoronix: The X API Is About 15 Times Bigger Than Wayland

    For those curious about the size of the X11 API in relation to Wayland, it's about fifteen times bigger...

    Phoronix, Linux Hardware Reviews, Linux hardware benchmarks, Linux server benchmarks, Linux benchmarking, Desktop Linux, Linux performance, Open Source graphics, Linux How To, Ubuntu benchmarks, Ubuntu hardware, Phoronix Test Suite
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