Mir Is Running On Arch Linux; Mir Also Progressing With EGLStreams Support

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Mir Is Running On Arch Linux; Mir Also Progressing With EGLStreams Support

Prominent Mir developer Alan Griffiths of Canonical has published his latest weekly update on the status of this Linux display server that continues working on supporting Wayland clients...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Mir-Arch-EGLStreams-Progress

[polarathene]

Is there stats on Linux users hardware? How many are using nvidia?

It'd be interesting to see what happens if users migrate to Wayland or Mir from X11 based on hardware. If nvidia doesn't get supported well on Wayland but Mir becomes a viable alternative with decent nvidia support, how likely are we to see that adoption over time, would we get a greater divide/fragmentation between Mir and Wayland due to the whole nvidia thing?

Could it be that nvidia support gives Mir that competitive edge(assuming there is a large amount of nvidia linux users still), increases it's adoption/popularity which would then weaken the leverage Wayland has been using with it's community stance against supporting nvidia's approach?

[GizmoChicken]

Could it be that nvidia support gives Mir that competitive edge(assuming there is a large amount of nvidia linux users still), increases it's adoption/popularity which would then weaken the leverage Wayland has been using with it's community stance against supporting nvidia's approach?

Mir (the display server) is being repurposed to function as a Wayland compositor (like GNOME's Mutter or KDE's KWin), and "Once Mir’s support for Wayland clients is on a par with the support for 'native' Mir clients [Canonical] will likely phase out support for the latter."

So, no, Mir and Wayland are no longer competitors. But sure, I suppose you could say that Mir is competing with Mutter, KWin, etc, for market share as a Wayland compositor.

[cl333r]

By now I'm all in for Mir and whatever, just to have a decent Unity 7/8 solution because I can't stand Gnome 3, Ubuntu's customized Gnome 3 looks like lipstick on a pig.

[Awesomeness]

By now I'm all in for Mir and whatever, just to have a decent Unity 7/8 solution because I can't stand Gnome 3, Ubuntu's customized Gnome 3 looks like lipstick on a pig.

Then use Plasma 5, duh.

[starshipeleven]

Is there stats on Linux users hardware? How many are using nvidia?

Nothing even remotely decent. We are waiting for Canonical to publish the data they collected from their installer as that's the most likely to give statistically relevant numbers.

But eyeballing it I would say it's NOT less than 50% on desktops (laptops with AMD graphics are quite rare so there the percentage is going to be much higher).

It'd be interesting to see what happens if users migrate to Wayland or Mir from X11 based on hardware.

As the other guy said, Mir is becoming a Wayland compositor, so the whole point you're making is moot.

But I agree with your suspicion, if Mir truly gets decent level of support for NVIDIA's own pet APIs then it becomes a very very interesting compositor for all the lesser desktops like MATE, XFCE, maybe Cinnamon and whatever else.

[Sonadow]

As the other guy said, Mir is becoming a Wayland compositor, so the whole point you're making is moot.

But I agree with your suspicion, if Mir truly gets decent level of support for NVIDIA's own pet APIs then it becomes a very very interesting compositor for all the lesser desktops like MATE, XFCE, maybe Cinnamon and whatever else.

And then the desktop stack will be split among three compositors; Mutter, Plasma and Mir. Fragmentation FTW.

Looks like we can kiss desktop streaming and recording utilities goodbye for the forseeable future under Wayland. Until somebody actually makes a universal extension to the Wayland protocol so that tools like SSR and OBS can work, it's never going to happen.

Don't come and tell me about the hack known as GreenRecorder which only works in Gnome and uses non-standard extensions. Or about how Pipewire is supposed to fill in this gap when the developers of SSR and OBS have no intention of using it.

[polarathene]

Mir (the display server) is being repurposed to function as a Wayland compositor (like GNOME's Mutter or KDE's KWin)

So, no, Mir and Wayland are no longer competitors. But sure, I suppose you could say that Mir is competing with Mutter, KWin, etc, for market share as a Wayland compositor.

Ah, thanks for the correction! Good to know I'm a big fan of KDE/Plasma so I'm personally more likely to adopt AMD hardware in future than migrate to a compositor that supports nvidia, though it'd be great if Kwin would support nvidia at some point, so here's hoping that new API eventually gets to a state it's accepted and supported!

I don't know enough about GBM or EGLStreams to know what they're doing exactly. What requires Wayland compositors to need them when X11 doesn't? These are separate from the GPU driver right? But the compositors cannot just interface with the GPU more directly, eg using Vulkan?(and it's opencl equivalent?)

[polarathene]

And then the desktop stack will be split among three compositors; Mutter, Plasma and Mir. Fragmentation FTW.

I don't think compositors equate to fragmentation so much as separate display servers like X11 and Wayland, and I guess in the sense of Wayland, nvidia's hardware/driver is more of a cause for fragmentation(yeah kinda due to certain compositors being against supporting it's EGLStreams approach...).

Beyond the screen recording, what other features are compositor specific that a developer would have to cater differently for each one vs X11?

Kwin is supporting the same approach as Mutter btw for using Pipewire to do screen recording. If Mir adopts that as well, it'll probably become standardized, some Wayland protocol would get sorted out, the big compositors support that and the smaller ones adopt it around then?

[starshipeleven]

And then the desktop stack will be split among three compositors; Mutter, Plasma and Mir. Fragmentation FTW.

Looks like we can kiss desktop streaming and recording utilities goodbye for the forseeable future under Wayland. Until somebody actually makes a universal extension to the Wayland protocol so that tools like SSR and OBS can work, it's never going to happen.

Don't come and tell me about the hack known as GreenRecorder which only works in Gnome and uses non-standard extensions. Or about how Pipewire is supposed to fill in this gap when the developers of SSR and OBS have no intention of using it.

I think you should throw yourself in a pond to cool down a bit before you snap like this at people.

Personally I don't need that, the only reason I need screen recording capability is for a future project about making my own IPMI system using a USB 3.0 capture card that uses the standard webcam drivers (so it runs fine on Linux), which I found on Aliexpress for 100-200 euros (depending on features), while most other USB 3.0 capture cards cost much more than that and need their own drivers (with crappy Linux support). In my master plan this thing is supposed to be connected to a device running OpenWrt, also emulating USB keyboard and mouse some other way (I have at least a few to try, not relevant in this discussion), plus a USB relay to operate the power on and reset switches of the server.
Still haven't bought it as I always got better things to do, but eventually I'm gonna try it.

I assume that to actually record your screen and not just be a screen itself it would need a HDMI/DVI/Displayport splitter of some sort so it intercepts the same stream you are looking at in your monitor, or failing that (in a laptop) you would need to connect this and then select "mirror screens" or whatever is the option in your DE's screen settings.