I appreciate you testing some of the edges and concerns you have in a productive way. Whilst I would have been happy with the first protocol I think this one is the best we've seen so far

I just wrote a lengthy reply to someone asking why there's hesitation to adopt absolute positioning, but it looks like the original post got deleted. So if anyone's interested, here's what I wrote: I like the original proposal; that's how I found it in the first place, but the people who don't like the original proposal have a few different reasons. The best complaint I heard was from someone who is building a VR compositor, and yeah, XY coordinates really don't make sense in a 3D space, so I get it. I think the latest proposal works better here, because you can easily place a virtual screen in 3D space. It's a similar situation with tiling compositors. Smart compositors could theoretically do something like this already to keep app windows clumped together, but it would be guess work that sometimes guesses wrong, and wouldn't work for multiple apps coordinating together. I feel like these developers are holding out hope that Qt, SDL, and all the other toolkits drop support for absolute positioning if Wayland doesn't support it, thereby forcing app authors to stop making these "distasteful" apps that work poorly with tiled managers, but I think that's unrealistic, especially now that JavaScript is getting support for absolute positioning. There's some people who are worried about security risks, where a malicious app does something like placing a borderless window over a credit card input field to capture your input. It's a stretch given you would have already had to give the malicious app permission to run, and to inspect your screen, but I'm glad someone's thinking about it. Then there's people who are just worried that if an app can place a window wherever it wants, then apps will start doing that all the time, and the desktop experience will be garbage, but I never bought that argument, because apps have been able to do that for about 40 years and generally haven't.

Either they deleted it or KZfaqs auto filter is running wild

@BrodieRobertson My guess is probably KZfaq, because on Thursday I tried to post a comment on your video without links and it disappeared TWICE.

@RickYorgason > I'm just doing a bit of light tire kicking on his proposals. And I am very thankful for that! And in this case I think the new proposal does actually improve upon X11 while still being not too much of a burden to port to and allowing enough cross-platform compatibility. It could even be augmented to work as session-management protocol, by simply making the workspace (now zone) handle persistent, allowing windows to restore themselves at the position where the user has left them. But I didn't want to make this too complicated (or start a riot by certain compositor developers), so I left this out for now.

wayland is a great example of perfection being the enemy of the good

Wayland is also a good example of having the end-user having the freedom to do anything... within the tight confines that the core developers define.

one day we will get there!

I like the "virtual coordinates" name. Workspaces is best used for virtual desktops.

@@softwarelivre2389 Virtual Coordinate Systems... wait a minute...

"Ideal for all (reasonable) parties" Ah well there's your problem right there, these are wayland devs we're dealing with. 😂

I may not be understanding this properly, but the multi-workspace suggestion seems like _the solution_ to make this feasible for tiling WMs, as it allows for arbitrarily irregular geometries. Practically, giving the multi-window workflow access to, say, 3/5 tiles while you have a web browser and a terminal having squares reserved on the remaining two seems like the ideal outcome.

However, I think you could achieve something similar with an "in-between" layer: A sort of mini-winow manager, that registers as a client with one window to the Wayland window manager, and offers an extended Wayland protocol to the applications, which allows free window positioning inside the registered Wayland window. This would save all the Wayland servers from implementing all the complexity this protocol imposes. It only needs to be something that works for all clients and can be set up in an easy way. Just think about the additional work this protocol would impose on the OS community: Every single Wayland window manager would need to re-implement the same thing. Instead, you could just have this in-between layer which would need to be written once, and solve it for all clients and all servers.

Sounds reasonable. I was thinking playgrounds :-)

"Virtual coordinates" seems good for me.

@@softwarelivre2389Virtual seems like the right word. I was going to suggest virtual relative screens. VRS is a good solid old-school TLA.

I have a feeling they might not like the term "screen" because wayland is trying to be more general than that

@@centdemeern1VRD for display? M for Matrix. VRCS (co-ordinate system) is an e-TLA...

This is an issue that is likely not ever going to effect the average user but I do expect RHEL to get a rude awakening from industry partners if they continue to sleep on issues like this one

Well XWayland will always be a fallback, and virtualization the _ultimate_ fallback.

wayland could be ready without gnome.

@@GSBarlev It will be funny if even 10 years from now, the main way people use Wayland is STILL through XWayland. Wayland by itself isn't a drop-in replacement for X11, but XWayland is... X11 applications can be adapted to the limitations of XWayland a lot more easily than they can be adapted to all the Wayland compositors out there. I know a few application developers who have said that their response to Wayland isn't going to be rewriting their application, but rather simply testing to see if it works well enough on XWayland and treating that as the new standard, with plans to drop Linux support if that ever stops working and they are forced to rewrite their application for Wayland to keep building a Linux version. I can easily imagine us winding up with something very much like what we already had, with KDE applications only working properly with KWin, GNOME applications only working properly with Mutter, and XWayland being the main half-busted fallback for more independent applications that aren't really in the KDE/GNOME space that need to coexist with multiple compositors and have some legacy support. I wonder if someone will wind up writing a Wayland compositor that is primarily intended to run XWayland as well as possible, perhaps even well enough to get X11 Window Managers working, and how the Wayland devs would react to that. But more seriously, look at the web browser space... Wayland is a protocol, just like HTTPS and HTML and all of those. Does anyone actually read the spec, or do they just try to code against the two main implementations of that spec, Firefox and Chromium, and treat those as the defacto standards regardless of what a spec or a protocol says? Seems to me like most web developers just write web pages for Chromium and not for web standards, and I can easily imagine most app developers just writing apps for GNOME and not caring about Wayland as a standard outside of that.

@@GSBarlev VMware UX has also regressed on Wayland/XWayland. There's noticable additional delay and a cool mouse lock/absolute repositioning bug similar to the ones in Wine and Barrier that messes with certain apps' 3D viewports and sliders (granted the gaming mouse setting fixes this but probably has its own issues).

Fair enough, I probably framed that sentence a bit off

It's impressive that none of the people who thought this was an important use case even mentioned it lol

There's also a somewhat more recent compositor called niri, which is infinitely scrolling but only horizontally. I use it right now, because I have a very wide monitor and find that it works nice for my workflow mostly

Fr, I just went bruhhhh I gotta click

Remove everything EXCEPT the first 3 words. Insta 4 million views

'So far I'?

I'm sad to hear this attitude is still present. It reinforces my decision to stay very far away from Linux in any role, and to minimize my use of any Unix in a desktop role. After years of fighting with Linux and noticing that just-about every other OS is easier to manage, I figured Linux contains a whole host of things being fixed in the wrong layer. Without knowing the history of every part, it could be due to those who should be responsible passing the buck. In one case, I know it's true: udev exists because Linus Torvalds refused to include DevFS. I recall experienced sysadmins finding udev painful to use.

Yes it basically is that

This is why Linux is so fragmented, devs don't want to collaborate so everyone says fork it and goes their own way

​@@IoraTeraThat's GNOME for you...

15:20 This is exactly my point. Why are they discussing ~entirely hypothetical~ scenarios when a simple protocol could've been built and tested to see how best to approach this issue? I don't think it'd make the discussion happen faster, necessarily, but at least these discussions would come to a conclusion instead of everyone having an imagined Wayland compositor in their heads.

I thought on "virtual coordinates" as well. The global one probably would make the name too long, but the idea is good.

Same. I don't even need to be able to place them at specific locations, just a way to query where my window is so certain interactions can work correctly. (such as docking)

@@bluesillybeard I think the fact that this hasn't been implemented as a most basic feature (like so many others) in Wayland is just insane. I don't buy their argument of security, and not only in this case.

@@stephanhuebner4931 Agreed. Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if another X11 successor shows up just because of Wayland's incompetence at making an actual product.

It's not wrong, but it's always jarring for me when Brodie says "Windows doesn't support tiling" given my first experience with tiling was Windows 3.1 😂

Tbf, multi-window was the main thing that made it difficult for me to learn GIMP, so when I tried it again after five years, I was pleasantly surprised to find the new one-window modal was the default. But yeah there are a ton of use-cases for multi-window applications, especially if you have multiple monitors, from nonlinear video editors, CAD software (as you say), IDEs, and basically any application where you want a persistent "preview" pane separate from your primary editor or command console.

The problem here is, as @Linuxdirk stated, there is an easy and "uninteresting" way, which is proven to work, and is widely compatible with current applications, but why do something that was already done, if you can instead do some crazy and hard shit that sounds cool as f*ck? And why I, as a developer, should implement this new way of doing things, instead of asking you to use The Old Way™, even if it means using old software? I mean, I'm working on this cool new feature here, ain't got no time to rewrite my windowses bro... 😋😅

@@eu_maxinne I disagree. There is a good reason to discard the old way of doing things, and quickly. Just because the Linux desktop is not a high-priority target for criminal actors (yet), that doesn't mean our display server and compositors should have zero protection against applications stealing sensitive data from each other - something the remaining ecosystem is actually well designed to do. X simply has no security, squandering any and all effort at it elsewhere. That said, a good solution should be as simple as possible given the desired features (in this case application isolation), and these endless discussions are not helpful in fixing the immediate issues users face.

Funny you should mention that. People ended up bringing up the idea of "modernizing" multi-window apps by wrapping them in a sub-compositor in the xdg-placement proposal and I pointed out how people hated MDI in Windows 3.1 enough that one of the selling points of Norton Desktop for Windows was reinventing Program Manager and File Manager to break their windows out of their MDI prisons so they could properly participate in a user-controlled stacking order.

I wonder how this will affect jelly-filled windows

It feels like it's getting easier as Wayland becomes default for more users. It was easy for Wayland to say "well behaved apps shouldn't do that" when it was only a relatively small number of developers and early adopters asking for these features, but now that the unwashed masses are using it, it's undeniable that, yes, we really do need screen capture, global shortcuts, screen tearing, absolute window positioning, cursor warping, and always-on-top windows. After 15 years of slow-as-molasses development, the last year feels like a huge shift. And as much as I hate to admit it, some good things have come out of Wayland's reluctance to accept these features, like support for sandbox engines, so your compositor can let you opt into an app recording your keystrokes in the background.

IIUC, Wayland developers are not sold on the idea of letting clients have as much control as they had on X11, and some of them seemingly think this app design is not correct at all. Also, take in mind that protocols have lengthy discussion periods because of the devs' intention to have good standards from the get go.

​@@lucas7061 And I'm not sold on the idea of Wayland devs telling me what I use is bad. I am perfectly happy using X11 until they get there heads out of there asses. I understand wanting a new system and I want wayland to work out, but most of there "lengthy discussions" boil down to Gnome devs trying there hardest to keep Wayland dysfunctional like there garbage desktop environment. At the rate Wayland have been going it will be finished way after the head death of the universe.

@@lucas7061who they are to say I am not allowed to start my "firefox --kiosk" fullscreen by setting proper geometry to fit the particular monitor I'm using, without window decorations and no virtual keyboard if my application requires that ?

Isn't that the normal mode of X11 now?

Window anchor or virtual coordinates seem good for me

Z axis shouldn't be paid attention to by conventional windowing systems, though if Wayland works out well enough it could be a reasonable inspiration for a 3d system.

@@absalomdraconis Traditional windowing systems could use z as simply indicating stacking order.

I think a better way to frame it is Wayland is too focused on perfection, we'll get something practical in the end but who cares how long that takes

​​@@BrodieRobertson Yeah, that's way better. Problem is with Xorg's clock ticking that's not really the time to do that😅 Wayland is a rare project (afaik) where its prime time is decided for it rather than by it, so it needs to be ready at the very least for every professional usecase. If that won't be the case... Eehhh it might be my pessimistic brain but I don't feel like companies will be as patient with it

Nor quite like a client (I assume you mean a single-window client), because raising one of the windows in the workspace in general should not raise all the windows in the workspace. Otherwise, what would be the point in multiple windows in the first place?

@@__christopher__ This avoids the problems with multiple window apps all together. It would basically be like a nested Wayland session, but with special properties, that the compositor can take care of, either by directly compositing them, or by spawning a nested session with special properties.

@@GegoXaren But the whole *point* of a multi-windowed application is that it doesn't behave like a single window. It's like "solving" the problem of traffic jams by just disabling cars from entering the road.

GNOME isn't a completely terrible project and of the devs I've spoken to personally they've all been great people but especially with how Wayland is handled I can understand that stance

Fr feels like at times they are just against every productive feature it shy im never going back to gnome hoping system 76 cosmic can make the gnome desktop but without all the bs

I think Wayland has a lot of wrong whole ideas.

The Wayland dev logic is maybe there's a better way. Wayland is also intended for non standard interfaces like a VR desktop where absolute coordinates wouldn't work

Allowing application windows to query their absolute position can leak information from the environment and possibly other applications, which is a _biiig_ security vulnerability. And one that is impossible to prevent in X by design. It's all fun and games to ignore such issues until some application tiled with your browser calculates and records a precise history of your browers' canvas size, uniquely identifying it within a few resizes and precisely tracking your every move on the web. Hope you have nothing to hide 🙂

@@Paulolz22 not really because you can't query the location of other apps so you can work out how many monitors exist, how big they are and where you're placed and minus the final point all of that is already visible outside of this. The browser concern isn't a concern of the compositor as you can already do that style of finger printing without this

@@BrodieRobertson Of course browser trackers already fingerprint your browser by precisely recording your canvas size history, and this is the issue: now they can observe parts of your system _outside_ your browser, badly breaking application isolation. Say you have a screen width of width X with a browser and a spy application tiled next to each other. As a web tracker, you know the browser's canvas size Y(t), so you can deduce that the application window width across time is Z(t) = X - Y(t). In other words, the size changes of both applications are identical and opposite. You now know information about another application you were never supposed to know. Even worse, if you are the vendor of both the tracker and that application (common for big corps like Google, MS, etc.), you know both instances and their account info are associated with the same person.

@Paulolz22 if you assume every window manager has the same layout

Then why not just use the single windowed mode at that point

@@tux_the_astronaut This does not work if I wanna put one window in one monitor. Example, Streaming. You need to separate monitors for chat, game, stream settings etc.

Effectively yes

Gamescope is a Wayland compositor, but I'm confused about the comparison

Applications being able to place their subwindows at arbitrary locations is the entire point, though.

@@CptJistuce The first protocol would allow apps to arbitrarily place the main window, ignoring my preference. And by the sounds of it, so does the third protocol. It seems like only the second protocol guarantees that the main window will be placed according to my preference, while also allowing its sub windows to be placed around the main window.

@@that_leaflet But the users of these multi-window applications don't want that behavior.

I want my windows opening with the layout intended by the developer, at least on the first run, as it hints at the intended way to use them. After first run, I want it to open according to where it was when I closed the application before... Is it that hard?

I do feel obliged to clarify my stance. As a general rule, I actively hate multiwindow applications and do my best to avoid using them. But the people using them have little alternative, and the desired use pattern for those programs is for the various subwindows to show up at specific screen locations every time.

Yeah that's a good way to look at it

there is a dimension where tiling became the standard and windowing systems would be recognized the for the trash that they are

@@KoopstaKlicca As long as your problem is that you can't do things the way you want to do, more power to you. But as soon as your problem is that *other* people don't want to do things the way you want them to do, no power to you. Just because *you* don't like traditional windowing systems doesn't make them trash.

@@__christopher__ k

Most tilers offer a floating mode, if it doesn't you should stop using it

i just don't want this feature being drag out/block more than it should be by tilers. maybe that's not the case and i am being nervous for nothing.

@@tsunekakou1275 I completely agree