Arch Linux

tonnz

Member

Registered: 2015-08-02

Posts: 38

Getting back to Linux. Experiences/thoughts on Wayland+Optimus?

Hello!

I had been using Arch happily for two years, until my Laptop died in October last year. Since then i have been stuck with Windows 10 on a new laptop, telling myself: "I'll wait until Wayland takes off".
But i can't wait anymore. Arch was my first Linux experience, and it was so great that it ruined Windows for me.
So, i am currently in the process of shrinking my Windows partition to make room for a magnificent new Arch install. Now comes the difficult decision:

Should i risk frustration and stress while trying to get Wayland+Optimus to work (which doesn't even seem very possible atm),
or should i default to X and risk being not as happy as i could be with a working Wayland install?

I've read that fedora and gnome are getting somewhere, but how much of that is reproducible with Arch (and ideally with only minimal coding/patching/compiling)?
I would be glad for any thoughts, experiences and opinions you could share with me!

Of course, i will be getting back to Arch Linux specifically. But i am not ruling out the option to resort to a different distro if it is necessary (which is why i didn't post this in an Arch-Specific subforum).

Last edited by tonnz (2017-04-05 21:03:10)

the sad clown

Member

From: 192.168.0.X

Registered: 2011-03-20

Posts: 837

Re: Getting back to Linux. Experiences/thoughts on Wayland+Optimus?

It would be difficult to recommend solo wayland unless one of the following applies to you:

a). You like GNOME.
b). You like bleeding edge stuff and don't mind breakage.

If, however, the above does describe you, then you should try it. You will almost certainly pull in both X11 and wayland as dependencies of other packages, so it would just be a matter of switching back and forth between them.

Last edited by the sad clown (2017-04-06 02:25:47)

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I laugh, yet the joke is on me

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 19,769

Re: Getting back to Linux. Experiences/thoughts on Wayland+Optimus?

Hey, the sad clown,

Always good to see you.  Glad you are back.

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Nothing is too wonderful to be true, if it be consistent with the laws of nature -- Michael Faraday
Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine. -- Alan Turing
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How to Ask Questions the Smart Way

tonnz

Member

Registered: 2015-08-02

Posts: 38

Re: Getting back to Linux. Experiences/thoughts on Wayland+Optimus?

It would be difficult to recommend solo wayland unless one of the following applies to you:

a). You like GNOME.
b). You like bleeding edge stuff and don't mind breakage.

If, however, the above does describe you, then you should try it. You will almost certainly pull in both X11 and wayland as dependencies of other packages, so it would just be a matter of switching back and forth between them.

I already had some limited wayland experience with kde on Arch, but using only open-source drivers and without gpu switching.
The most recent info i was able to find about wayland+optimus is a blog entry of a fedora dev*. And now that i have read it, it doesn't really raise my hopes to get it to work on Arch, it's very Fedora-specific.
One question: How much does xwayland help? Will it help getting gpu-switching methods to work (bumblebee, prime), or will i have to resort to nested X/Wayland instances (ie, Wayland under Xorg, i assume the reserve is also possible. Doesn't xwayland also fall into this category)? Unless the latter is the case, i'll try it.

* https://blogs.gnome.org/uraeus/2016/11/ … tation-25/

Last edited by tonnz (2017-04-06 23:26:43)