Major distros are soon switching to versions of desktop environments that use Wayland instead of X11. This is a bad state of affairs for accessibility.
like any opensource project, it largely depends on how much widely adopted it is. OP’s case is actually a good example, as as they brought attention towards the problems with this certain software, it’s now more likely that someone will get to fixing the issue.
Also, there still are lots of well-maintained x11 wms and this fact doesn’t seem to be changing any time soon.
People treating Wayland as a “finished beta” (more like a finished alpha, really) and forcing it unto release / production distros is what got us “here”.
Start by supporting it in devel / testing / closed beta / whatever. Then get to production.
There were years of announcing the sunsetting of X, and many large projects and companies simply refused to work on it. Nvidia is a good example. Eventually, after pushing off the sunsetting multiple times, it had to happen.
, and many large projects and companies simply refused to work on it.
Which made sense at the time! Wayland was (and still is) barely vaporware, a “mission and vision” doc essentially saying “here’s what we want Linux desktop to be like, now all of you you go and build it for us”.
At this point Wayland is basically “winning” because of sunk cost. Just because X11 is the wrong answer doesn’t make Wayland the right one.
We could stop and say “here’s what we learned was problematic from both X11 and Wayland and how people actually use computers in 2025, how would we solve these problems knowing that?” But then we’d have to start again from square 1, and nobody with the clout to make it happen is pushing for that.
the infuriating thing is I’m on wayland because I have to be on wayland but given the option I would use x11 simply because the choices for WM’s are better and overall I prefer x11 even though I know it’s “dying”.
The problem is on my specific main laptop which I use for work and everything it’s a dual amd/nvidia GPUs. Nvidia being the main GPU and AMD being secondary. x11 does NOT like this at all. So some programs will completely crash out if left unfocused for more than 2minutes. i.e. i’m testing something and need to move away from that workspace and if I go back the thing is graphically unresponsive. on Wayland it’s not an issue. Gaming on x11? forget about it, it’s a no go.
Now there are things on Wayland that just infuriate me. For example Discord. If i’m on a call with someone on discord I HAVE to keep that discord workspace active otherwise I can’t use the keybinds to push to talk or anything. on x11? not an issue. So i’m constantly having to switch my WM’s from a wayland one to an x11 one for the dumbest reasons.
Well, in this case there was literally one standard, X11, in use since the late 80s. Now we have two, and the new one makes my mouse disappear when it hovers over any sort of map in firefox.
The problems with Wayland are not inherent to Wayland. They are a lack of features that could be added to Wayland without any particular technical difficulty. The problem is that the major players behind Wayland do want many of those features to exist. A second issue is that the standardization process for new Wayland features is slow at best.
None of these issues are helped by replacing Wayland.
bUw waYlAnD iS tHe FuTurE!
(tbf, then bring it in in the future, when it’s ready)
like any opensource project, it largely depends on how much widely adopted it is. OP’s case is actually a good example, as as they brought attention towards the problems with this certain software, it’s now more likely that someone will get to fixing the issue.
Also, there still are lots of well-maintained x11 wms and this fact doesn’t seem to be changing any time soon.
I didnt read the article yet, but people choosing to not support it till it’s perfect is what got us here.
People treating Wayland as a “finished beta” (more like a finished alpha, really) and forcing it unto release / production distros is what got us “here”.
Start by supporting it in devel / testing / closed beta / whatever. Then get to production.
There were years of announcing the sunsetting of X, and many large projects and companies simply refused to work on it. Nvidia is a good example. Eventually, after pushing off the sunsetting multiple times, it had to happen.
Which made sense at the time! Wayland was (and still is) barely vaporware, a “mission and vision” doc essentially saying “here’s what we want Linux desktop to be like, now all of you you go and build it for us”.
I get what you’re saying but am going to push back on calling it vaporware. It’s definitely real.
At this point Wayland is basically “winning” because of sunk cost. Just because X11 is the wrong answer doesn’t make Wayland the right one.
We could stop and say “here’s what we learned was problematic from both X11 and Wayland and how people actually use computers in 2025, how would we solve these problems knowing that?” But then we’d have to start again from square 1, and nobody with the clout to make it happen is pushing for that.
the infuriating thing is I’m on wayland because I have to be on wayland but given the option I would use x11 simply because the choices for WM’s are better and overall I prefer x11 even though I know it’s “dying”.
The problem is on my specific main laptop which I use for work and everything it’s a dual amd/nvidia GPUs. Nvidia being the main GPU and AMD being secondary. x11 does NOT like this at all. So some programs will completely crash out if left unfocused for more than 2minutes. i.e. i’m testing something and need to move away from that workspace and if I go back the thing is graphically unresponsive. on Wayland it’s not an issue. Gaming on x11? forget about it, it’s a no go.
Now there are things on Wayland that just infuriate me. For example Discord. If i’m on a call with someone on discord I HAVE to keep that discord workspace active otherwise I can’t use the keybinds to push to talk or anything. on x11? not an issue. So i’m constantly having to switch my WM’s from a wayland one to an x11 one for the dumbest reasons.
Well, in this case there was literally one standard, X11, in use since the late 80s. Now we have two, and the new one makes my mouse disappear when it hovers over any sort of map in firefox.
The problems with Wayland are not inherent to Wayland. They are a lack of features that could be added to Wayland without any particular technical difficulty. The problem is that the major players behind Wayland do want many of those features to exist. A second issue is that the standardization process for new Wayland features is slow at best.
None of these issues are helped by replacing Wayland.