robbert-vdh
What is the future of this project?
Feature description
Gnome is dropping X11 support, KDE just announced they're dropping X11 support in 2027, and Yabridge can't provide Wayland support because of missing features. I just switched to Linux about 6 weeks ago, and Yabridge has been the only way to make that possible as there are certain audio software that Linux just doesn't seem to have a good native equivalent for (I know that's a separate topic). But with this seeming impass between the general direction of Linux desktop and Yabridge requirements, I'm wondering if I'm putting my eggs in the wrong basket. Can anyone speak to the viability of this project going forward as more desktops and/or distros drop X11 support? Does this project have a future or is time running out?
Anything else?
No response
I could be wrong, but I don't see what the issue is since a lot of people are already using wayland with yabridge quite fine. the current version of yabridge with wine 9.21 is pretty stable and works under wayland just fine. what are you asking then?
there are improvements that are necessary to be sure, but they don't have much to do with wayland/x11 as far as I understand.
To be clear, the project isn't on a deadline with some impending breakage on the horizon.
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You'll always be able to run x11 on linux if you need it
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VST bridging on wine 9.21 is extremely stable
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Wayland isn't the main blocker for yabridge anyway. The fundamental challenge is yabridge sits between a constantly evolving API (wine) and DAWs with their own litany of quirks. That's inherently a moving target. Occasional breakages come from that, not Wayland itself. This is part of the tradeoff when using wine.
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Lots of audio software is still ironing out Wayland quirks. Many DAWs still depend on X11 internally. 'switching to wayland' is not really a clean switch. Backward compatibility is a still a priority for distros.
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If your setup works now, it will keep working for a long time yet
Thanks for the responses. Maybe I'm confused, maybe I'm too new to the Linux world to know how to read between the lines when entities such as Gnome or KDE make public announcements. This is what I'm confused about:
@mito551 said: wine 9.21 is pretty stable and works under wayland just fine. I don't understand this. The Yabridge release notes for 5.0.5 states in part: Yabridge now preemptively unsets the WAYLAND_DISPLAY environment variable when launching Wine....This change makes sure that Wine will keep using X11 even if Wayland support becomes available at some point. This makes it sound like X11 is mandatory and that, if it's true people are using Yabridge with Wayland, they're just lucky it works.
@dylanwright said: You'll always be able to run x11 on linux if you need it. I don't know if I completely agree with that. Maybe I just have PTSD from Windows maliciously pulling the rug out from under its users, but when I hear both Gnome and KDE are in a big hurry to drop X11, it sounds to me like time is limited. I mean, KDE's statement was they are going to focus on Wayland so they can develop new features faster. That doesn't sound like concern for backward compatibility. I think what you're really saying is that my setup will work for a long time as long as I don't upgrade to new distro releases or new versions of the desktop environments. Which is fine, as long as I know that's the expectation/requirement. I don't need the latest and greatest everything. I just need audio to keep working.
FYI, I do have a working setup right now with Wine 9.21, etc... My concern, again based on the things above that I read/heard, is for the long term viability.
Just to clarify a couple of things
x11 being available and a desktop environment making Wayland the default are two different things. When GNOME or KDE say they're "dropping X11", it means they won't default to X11 or actively develop X11 features. They aren't removing the ability to run Xorg. Distros (GNOME and KDE are desktops not distros) will continue shipping it because too much software depends on it.
On linux, no one can rug pull you, honestly. If a workflow needs X11, you can keep using it. If you want a desktop that continues to support it long-term, there's plenty of alternatives to GNOME and KDE.
Wine + yabridge are currently running on X11 (or Xwayland) as it's the most stable setup for DAWs atm. That's likely one reason yabridge had unset WAYLAND_DISPLAY. Wines Wayland driver isn't really mature enough for complex nested GUIS like VSTS. X11 is more reliable in this case.
It doesn't mean you have to have an outdated distro. I'm on a fully up to date system using X11 specifically for audio work. Distros continue to ship both Xorg and Wayland and it's not going to disappear.
As for the actual "future of the project". Only Robbert can speak directly about whether deeper Wayland integration is planned. But Yabridge sits on top of Wine and Wines API is the main thing that changes under it not Wayland. If future Wayland support in Wine becomes more robust, maybe there's a path. But if not X11 will still be there to use.
Long-term viability of your setup is ultimately something you control. Discussing the broader future of Linux audio/desktops/Wine is probably a better fit for the discord. I'm not personally active there, but it might be a good place to get into the finer details.
@dylanwright Thank you for your clarifications. That helps me understand the landscape better.
@xpnctoc You have likely been on the receiving end of fearmongering. KDE will only be dropping X11 session support, and will not drop X11 support entirely. This means that they will no longer support configurations where Xorg is being used as the main display server. Xwayland (which is based on Xorg) has and will continue to run X11 applications on Wayland. Wine works perfectly fine on Xwayland and will likely stay on Xwayland until the Wine Wayland driver is more complete.
https://blogs.kde.org/2025/11/26/going-all-in-on-a-wayland-future/
I just switched to Linux about 6 weeks ago
Yeah i could tell that, so here is a little guide on what linux currently is. All of the wayland stuff is for investors only. They need to raise money, investors need to see flashy words and impressive prototypes. So we should all talk about it everywhere and make it hype, but real humans only use x11 and plasma 5. There will be no future. The future is now. Peak of productivity is now. Its only gonna be getting worse from there. So don't waste your time and make music while you still can
All of the wayland stuff is for investors only. They need to raise money, investors need to see flashy words and impressive prototypes. So we should all talk about it everywhere and make it hype, but real humans only use x11 and plasma 5.
This is just SO wrong and ignorant of the real world that I just had to respond, especially since this is a response to a beginner and by spreading such an uninformed opinion you're actively degrading the experience they could have on Linux. What "real humans" are you talking about? Me and basically everyone in my friend group who use Linux either use a Wayland desktop or some sort of Wayland compositor, and have been for a few years at this point, and statistics show that most GNOME and KDE users, in fact, are on Wayland. Also, Wayland is not "flashy words and impressive prototypes" as you say - it offers many real benefits that just aren't possible on X11 by design, such as HDR, true multi-monitor support, monitors with different refresh rate, built in compositing to combat tearing, a much more efficient network flow and lots, lots of security (literally anything on X11 can be a keylogger even without root access btw). I have two monitors with different resolutions, one at 165 hz and the other at 75. Guess what, in X11, I would be forced to run both of them at 75 hz because X11 support for multiple monitors is simply a glued-together hack.
There will be no future. The future is now. Peak of productivity is now. Its only gonna be getting worse from there.
Wayland is improving daily while X11 is rotting because it literally lacks maintenance and the only updates it's receiving are fixes related to XWayland, the compatibility layer for old X11-only apps to be able to run on Wayland.
Anyways, here's an actual guide to Linux: just use whatever works for you. Wayland is more modern, more well-supported and technically superior to X11, but still has some rough edges here and there. For example, NVidia GPUs are still hit or miss on Wayland (which is the fault of NVidia refusing to support it properly, and not the Wayland developers). So, if you can, you should use Wayland, and if there's a breaking bug in there for you, report it to the developers and keep using X11.
Also, you can still run X11 stuff in Wayland, and will be able to for the foreseeable future! Nobody is removing XWayland, the compatibility layer that lets you run X11 stuff in Wayland - they're getting rid of running the entire desktop in X11. Your DAW and your plugins running through wine and yabridge can still run just fine, and will be able to even after that change. In fact, that's what I'm currently doing - I run REAPER on Gnome with Wayland, with some plugins using yabridge and wine - and everything works perfectly. I'm doing it professionally too, which means you can (probably) trust me to understand what I'm talking about.
As for the future of this project, it is unclear what has to happen for there to be real progress in supporting newer wine versions, but for now, you can either use the dev branch with a few small bugs here and there, or use an older version of wine, or use a manually patched version of wine. However, yet again, there is no rush or critical deadline to this, and all 3 of these fixes will keep working for the foreseeable future, so there's no need to worry for you as an end user.
Hope this clears things up!
This is exactly what i was talking about. Wayland influencers are instructed to be agressive in their reaction to any kind of truth about x11, saying that its "rotting" and "basically everyone uses wayland", calling any statements "SO wrong" and instantly starting holy war, which will usually result in x11 users being banned, because admins are sponsored by redhat too.
Since i just have nothing better to do with my life today, for nothing other than fun i will reply to this person's statements one by one.
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You must have never tried actually using multiple monitors with different refresh rates under x11. x11 indeed uses single big rendering area for multiple monitors support, but thinking that all the monitors will be forced to lowest rate or even LCM of their rates is a bit stupid to say the least. It was able to work with different rr monitors before wayland was able to output anything to the monitor at all. Im currently using two monitors 60 and 165 on x11 and window manager both 3 years old and seriously outdated, and unlike the person above i can submit a slow mo video of them working at their rated frequencies just perfectly.
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HDR. i would not argue that some people do really need it for whatever reason, and its disappointing for them if it does not work. However i wonder if you'd be able to even describe what HDR actually means and how it functions, and after doing so, you would still think hdr a good concept and this is how monitors should work, then... idk man. It would raise quite a lot of questions.
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yep, you sure can run x11 apps in wayland most of the time (unless you need automation, window/cursor positioning, screen recording from x11 app or a couple of other features you sure can live without), its just that in "XWayland" the "Wayland" is unnecessary.
i expect this post to be deleted, and i understand why, and i support the mission of wayland propaganda that people are forcing on the entire internet, and i will happily become wayland influencer myself. But only just as soon as redhat starts paying me. (redhat plz contact me [email protected])
alright im really sorry if i offended or hurt anyone, its obviously a satire (only the redhat and influencers part. x11 part is all true and x11 is indeed better in almost all aspects (except for security, thou xlibre fixes that), especially for music production)
this is why linux and linux community get a bad rep. go do something useful with your time